


The Target

by kimurasato



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-01
Updated: 2014-05-02
Packaged: 2018-01-21 11:49:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 58,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1549505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimurasato/pseuds/kimurasato
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vlad is a successful hit man, but his next assignment might not be as easy as he expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this idea after gothiethefairy on tumblr suggested the idea of Vlad being a successful hit man.

Vlad tugged at the red bow tie that he always wore as he entered his castle in Wisconsin. He felt exhausted after arriving home from his trip to Europe for his last assignment. It was a simple job, and he managed to pull it off without being caught. Of course. That was the whole reason he was a billionaire: he was the most successful hit man in the business. But that wasn't surprising since he had a secret that no one else shared. He was half ghost. He could easily slip into the homes of his targets and take them out without being seen. Literally. Invisibility, he smirked, was quite the useful skill to have, along with being able to actually walk through walls.

His employers were unaware of that fact. Very few knew about his half ghost status, and those that did were ghosts, who learned about him during his trips through the Ghost Zone. He used some of the ghosts that he encountered on occasion. There was a group of vultures that picked up his payment and next target information from the drop off point. He could do it himself without worry of being caught, because he knew he was on a wanted list by this point, with his invisibility. He could even go in his ghost form which would keep them from discovering that the man they were looking for was Vlad Masters. But he wouldn't want to give the people around him a fright by appearing as a ghost. He only utilized the vultures to give himself a bit more free time. With all the jobs that he did, it was nice to get a moment of peace to sip tea and read a book.

When he reached his study, a familiar white envelop waited for him on the table next to his cozy chair by the fire. He sighed tiredly as he walked over to the chair and dropped into it. His eyes closed for a brief moment, taking his time before reaching over to pick up the envelop. Who would it be this time? Some diplomat from another country? He didn't wish to travel out of the country again after he only just got back. Some CEO in a company? That seemed rather mundane, but there were plenty of people seeking to take over a company by eliminating the man in charge. He lost count of how many of his assignments involved that type of situation, but he was fairly certain it was at the top of the list.

One.  
Two.  
Three.  
Four.  
Five.

Vlad counted out in his head, taking slow deep breaths as he let his mind drift in nothingness for that time. Then he opened his dark blue eyes and turned his gaze upon the envelop. He could always put off the assignment. A day wouldn't hurt anything. But there would always be another assignment at the ready after he finished this one. He frowned, realizing there really wasn't much else in his life beyond the constant jobs of assassinating other people. He never questioned it, why these people had to die for the greed of another. That wasn't his job. He was hardly a good person. He had sins piled high to the sky.

He stared at the plain white envelop that held no identifying markers to it. No names were printed upon it, no acknowledgement of whom it was for or from. Vlad slid his finger through the top of the envelop, deftly slicing it open. Turning it upside down, the information packet slipped out into his waiting hand. He tossed the envelop into the fire before glancing down at the photograph of the unlucky bastard that would be his next target.

His mind went blank immediately when his eyes landed upon the picture attached to the front of the details to the job. Blue eyes stared back at him with that ridiculously goofy grin on the man's face. The man lost the mullet that he used to have in college, the bottom of his hair turning white from age. Despite all the years that passed, the man hadn't changed all that much in terms of looks since the last time they saw each other.

"Well, Jack," Vlad said as he leaned back in his chair. "What mess have you gotten yourself into?"


	2. Chapter 1

He reviewed the information in the package that was presented to him several time, though there really wasn't much of interest provided within it. His client wished for Jack Fenton to be killed, the manner of which didn't matter so long as he was out of the way. Vlad frowned at that as he disassembled one of his guns, cleaned it, then reassembled it perfectly. His dark blue eyes glanced at the clock when he was finished. Bested his time by three seconds. It was habit he picked up over the years in his line of work. There was something calming in the action, helping to clear his mind and focus it on the task ahead.

It still baffled him that someone wanted Jack dead. His mind turned back to their days in college, best of friends and roommates throughout his entire time there. Up until the incident that caused him to have ghost powers and left him in the hospital for several years while he recovered from a terrible case of ecto acne. It was only after he was released, announced as completely cured by the doctors, that he discovered his best friend betrayed him to marry the woman that he loved.

Vlad frowned, setting the gun down carefully upon the table beside the chair in which he sat. He never actually spoke of his affections for Maddie, merely gazing at her from afar and quietly pining away at her. They were members of the same club that researched into paranormal activities, sought to uncover the truth about ghosts. In the beginning, it was only he and Jack, but at the beginning of their second year at the University of Wisconsin, a third member joined them. Maddie was just as interested in ghosts as they were. She was smart and beautiful, and Vlad fell for her at first sight. It still stung at his heart to know that Jack married her. If not for that accident, Vlad would have asked her on a date that day, but his chance was cruelly stolen away from him.

Beyond his own personal grudge toward the man, Vlad could see no reason for anyone to seek to kill him. The client's name was unlisted, only stating that he would receive a deposit of two million dollars into his account when the job was done. Someone certainly wanted to ensure Jack's death by hiring him. On any other assignment, Vlad would never even bother to question anything about his target. He would go to the destination, watch for the best opportunity, and kill the target without being seen. But this time was different. This target hit too closely to home for him. This was his old friend, his college buddy, the man with whom he spent nearly four years of his life living in the same cramped apartment. This should be a godsend to him, the perfect excuse to eliminate Jack then swoop in to comfort Maddie and slowly win her heart. But the question kept turning over in his head: why Jack?

Vlad stood from his chair, deciding he spent more than enough time in the ritzy hotel room. The comforts didn't even compare to his castle. His gun vanished into one his hidden holsters where no one would even notice that he was carrying the weapon. A silencer was in his suit pocket. He carried daggers, strapped to his ankles, hidden in sleeves, tucked behind his back, and all within easily reachable access. He could kill just as easily with his ghost powers, but he preferred not drawing attention to his supernatural abilities. He made his kills easily recognized for natural weapons: guns, knives, sometimes poisons. Things like energy balls would make the coroners that examined the bodies start asking too many questions, as would some other methods he could think of employing.

He left the hotel, looking the part of a successful business man, a perfect disguise that threw off those searching for the infamous hit man. He doctored up documentation that no one would be able to prove false. A smirk drew subtly across his face as he thought of how easy it all was. Those in his profession that got caught were fools, amateurs too stupid to understand the necessity for discretion. No one could last in this business without knowing how to cover their tracks, to keep their heads low and not brag and boast over every kill.

His first task on any mission was to stalk his prey. At their homes, or hotel rooms, was usually the easiest location to kill the target. Some assignments required a more public showing, clients wanting to be present to throw suspicion off them. Vlad shook his head at such thoughts, never understanding the minds of those clients. He had the feeling that this case would be more complicated. Jack was married to Maddie, that much he knew without need of reading the file. Killing him at home would require some finesse. Vlad didn't want to endanger Maddie's life in the process of performing his job. He needed to find a time when Jack wouldn't be in Maddie's presence.

The past week Vlad spent his days observing Jack's movements. Rarely did Jack go anywhere without his wife at his side. Ghosts were a more frequent part of life in Amity Park, Vlad discovered on the very first day when he trailed the Fentons to a ghost attack. Their weaponry impressed him, seeing their research assisted the improvement of their inventions. Maddie was as skilled a fighter as he remembered. Jack was - Well, he hadn't changed much either over the years.

But he had a plan for creating his opening. Hacking wasn't a difficult task to accomplish, especially when he happened to know of a ghost that could control all technology. A simple message that appeared to be from her sister got Maddie packing in a hurry. Vlad checked his watch. At this very moment, Maddie should be on a plane to Arkansas to see her, supposedly, ailing sister Alicia. And that meant that right now, Jack was finally alone, a sitting target for a hit man like Vlad to easily take out.

Night already started to fall, the sun almost completely vanishing beyond the horizon. The street lights flickered on as Vlad reached the house with the gaudy, tacky sign that read Fenton Works. Jack never was one for subtlety. The eyesore made Vlad cringed, but at least he never had to doubt that this address was correct. A light was on in the front room, signaling that someone was in fact home. Vlad glanced around the quiet neighborhood before he approached the house. Cautiously, he peeked into the front room, spying Jack sitting on the couch as he miserably flicked through the channels on the television. Not more than a few hours passed since Maddie left for the airport. Why did Jack have to look so pathetically crushed over the short separation with his wife? It was irritating to know how much in love the two of them were.

The click of the safety releasing on a gun was a familiar sound to him after all his years as a hit man.

"Turn around slowly."


	3. Chapter 2

Vlad frowned dully when he heard those three words. It wouldn't be the first time he was held at gunpoint. In his early days as a hit man, he was a bit sloppy with it, but he was a quick learner. His ghost powers, of course, helped a lot in mastering the art of stealth to avoid being easily spotted by cops and security. Occasionally, he had other assassins to be on the watch for, when his clients decided that they needed to be extra certain that the job got done.

He turned slowly to face the gunman, not because he was ordered to do so but because the situation left his mind confused. It was rare after all his training that anyone would get the jump on him, and he was rather curious to find out just whom this person was. They deserved perhaps minor praise for that one time surprise advantage, though the man gave himself away by cocking the gun and growling out the order.

His eyebrows lifted a fraction of an inch, showing off mild surprise when his blue eyes landed upon the man before him. The man couldn't possibly be much older than eighteen. Despite the deceptively innocent face, the man clearly knew what he was doing with the gun that he held mere inches from Vlad's face, trained right between his eyes. All the man had to do was squeeze the trigger, and any normal man wouldn't stand a chance of surviving at that close range.

"Any reason I shouldn't put a bullet in your head right this very second?" the man demanded, narrowing oddly bright green eyes. But they weren't nearly as strange as the pure white hair, which ruined the stealthy, all black attire the man wore. It drew a frown from Vlad, who pondered how the man wound up with that shade of hair. Even dying or bleaching it didn't seem like it would result in that pure whiteness. At eighteen, the man was certainly far too young to have his all his hair go white naturally.

"Now, son-"

"I'm _not_ your son," the man snapped, pressing the barrel of the gun into Vlad's head as anger flashed in his green eyes.

It looked like Vlad had found a nerve with that comment. He schooled his expression before a sly smirk could slip onto his face. "You're a bit quick to draw there, aren't you?" He held up his hands to show that they were empty. Perhaps the man would drop his guard if he thought Vlad was unarmed.

"I don't trust people who come sneaking around to spy into someone's home," the man stated, not lowering the weapon like Vlad hoped. "What were you doing?"

Vlad sighed internally because he really didn't want to deal with some child. As soon as he finished his job, he could return to his cozy castle in Wisconsin and, hopefully, get the chance to relax for once. But apparently before he could get to his target, he would have to go through this man first. Not that he looked like much of a challenge with his lean build, from what Vlad could tell under the dark clothing.

"That would be none of your business," Vlad replied, displaying his bored in his dull glare.

If the man truly wanted to kill him, he would have done it already instead of giving himself away in such an obvious manner. His movements were quick, practiced after years of training. Vlad grabbed hold of the man's wrist, twisting it aside before the gun could be fired. A shot rang out, and he winced as the blast went off too close to his ear, leaving a ringing behind in his left ear. The man countered swiftly, swinging his other hand, curled in a tight fist, around to throw a punch. Vlad reacted at once, raising his free arm to block, receiving only a glancing blow to his right cheek before he knocked away the arm.

"Didn't your mother ever tell you not to play with guns?" Vlad met the man's glare as he drove his head forward, slamming their foreheads together in a loud blow that sounded like one or both of their skulls could have cracked. Now that he thought about it, that probably wasn't the best move as an ache throbbed blindingly in his head. The young man had a head as hard as a rock, but the head butt drove the man back several steps as he held a hand to his forehead. Both of them were bound to have lumps on their heads after that blow.

"Oh, I don't need the gun to kick your butt, _old man_." Reaching behind his back, the man tucked the gun away then brought his arms up before him. His hands were tight fists, and hard determination was written in every line on his face.

Vlad's mouth pursed in frustrated annoyance. This wasn't in any way how he planned on this job going. He figured there would be some complications with Jack being a ghost hunter. The house could always have ghost detection set up around it to alert the man if a ghost tried to enter the house or any number of traps to capture any ghost that dared pass through the walls of the house. Vlad planned on being cautious about this job, not wanting any slip ups to land him into some serious trouble. Jack maybe a goof and clumsy, but that didn't mean his inventions didn't work.

But now he had some child, not even out of his teen years, to deal with before he could even complete his assignment. Vlad hadn't prepared for the young man's appearance, and he preferred only having to take out his target. But if it was the only to get his job done, then Vlad would simply have to incapacitate the man for the time being.

The man came at him, fists flying. He was, surprisingly, far better at fighting than Vlad imagined from his appearance. His strikes were quick and well positioned to cause maximum injury with little effort. His movements weren't wasted, but Vlad was no slouch when it came to a fight. Years of training and fights taught him how to predict his opponent's movements. He didn't come out unscathed, but he managed to avoid any serious injuries.

"Not bad, kid," Vlad said, his side aching from a recent punch that managed to connect though failed to hit a vital spot.

"I'm surprised you can move like that, old man." A smirk cut across the man's face, almost like he was enjoying the fight. "But maybe you should take it easy. I wouldn't want you to snap your poor fragile bones. At your age, they'd probably never heal."

"Making banter about my age. You must think you're quite witty." Vlad sneered, not amused even slightly by such juvenile comments.

The man's cocky grin remained on his face for a moment before his expression crumbled away into what looked like he wanted to sigh out in exasperation. Vlad cocked an eyebrow, curious to know what caused the change in the man's expression. It was only a second later, as the man was moving to back away, that he got his answer. Silver metal flashed in the corner of his eyes, and in the next instant, the wires wrapped tightly around him, binding not only himself but the other man, who hadn't moved fast enough to escape. They were pressed flush against one another with hardly an inch of room to move, and their metal bindings showed no signs of loosening despite any effort to struggle free.

_Butter biscuits!_ This was most certainly not how this assignment was meant to go. Vlad yanked this way and that way, trying find some way to wiggle free.

"You can stop trying to escape," the man said dully as he stared unimpressed. Then his gaze looked past Vlad. "I told you stay inside the house."

"Sorry. I thought I could help out." That voice undeniably came from Jack Fenton. Vlad gritted his teeth in frustration, already having an idea of what was going to happen. "Check it out!" Jack came into view with that stupid grin on his face as he held up an invention, or the handle part of it, that was attached to the metal wires wrapped around the pair of men. "The Jack-o-Nine-Tails! It worked. Sort of." He rubbed the back of his neck in embarrassment.

Vlad was counting down the seconds in his head, waiting for the giant of a man to realize something. He could see the blue eyes turn onto him, and Jack's mouth dropped open as his eyes grew wide with shock.

"Vladdie!" Jack drew both men into a crushing embrace in his attempt to hug Vlad. "You should have told me you were stopping by for a visit."

"You know this guy?" the white haired man demanded, gawking in shock at Jack, who still hadn't placed them back on the ground.

"Of course!" Jack grinned, big and dopey. "We were roommates in college."

"And it's very nice to see you again." Vlad stuck to pleasantries, seeing no way out of this until he found some way to escape from the metal wires wrapped around him. "But perhaps you could release us?"

"Oh, right!" With a laugh, Jack turned them to the open front door of his house, not bothering to let them walk, as clumsy as that would be, on their own, instead carrying them inside. "I haven't quite worked all the bugs out, and release button seems to jam up a bit. Just give me a few minutes in the lab, and I'll have you free in a jiffy!"

Vlad felt the strong urge to simply blast the pair of men with energy balls as Jack hauled them through the house to the door that led into the basement where the laboratory presumably was located. He really should have expected some sort of catastrophe to happen when Jack was involved. After all, it was Jack's fault that Vlad ended up with ghost powers in the first place.


	4. Chapter 3

How could it possibly be taking the man this long to figure out how to free them from his stupid invention? The question repeated through Vlad's mind for the past hour as Jack worked on fixing the jamming of the release button. If the other two men weren't present, he could use his ghost powers to simply phase himself free of the blasted wire bindings. Instead, he was stuck staring face to face with the glaring teenager, who looked like he was promising death to Vlad the moment they were free of Jack's invention.

"I still don't trust this man," he announced, and Vlad had to give the white haired man points for having some sense in that head of his. "He turns up right after Maddie left? That just smells of being a little too coincidental."

"Oh, Maddie isn't home? What a pity!" Vlad managed to actually look disappointed by that news. "I would have liked to see her again." He almost let a smirk slip past him when the man narrowed his bright green eyes.

"See?" Jack said, taking his attention off his work as he slapped a large hand around Vlad's shoulders, which nearly had the two bound men banging their heads again. "Vladdie just wanted to come visit his old buddy. Am I right?" Jack grinned, oblivious to any anger radiating off the two men as he gave Vlad a shake.

Vlad sighed tiredly at his predicament, feeling unusually exhausted in that moment. This situation was the last thing he could have predicted when going into this assignment. He needed to think of what to do once he got free of Jack's invention. There was always the option of jumping right into an attack. They were alone in the basement of the house, which meant no one from outside would be able to see the fight, and unless they started making enough of a racket, no one would bother to call the police for a disturbance. But the odds didn't look good for him. The white haired man proved that he was a well trained fighter, despite his young age, and Jack could be dangerous, even with his clumsiness. Fighting them both at once might be a poor decision, so Vlad came to the conclusion that his best option at the moment was to play the old college buddy card and wait for a better opportunity.

"Ugh!" complained the white haired man as his face scrunched up, and he twisted his head to the side. "What did you eat? Your breath reeks!"

Vlad lifted one eyebrow with a dull stare at the man's childish reaction. It was still utterly amazing that this man had such decent fighting abilities. "It's called lobster, son." His nose wrinkled in a small sneer.

"It's called nasty, puke inducing fish breath, fruit loop." The man glared at him.

"Lobster is a crustacean." Vlad returned the glare.

"Whatever!" the man exclaimed, clearly not caring to be corrected. "Your breath still stinks."

"Your wit astounds me," Vlad replied dryly.

"Silence!" Jack shouted, making both men jerk their heads around toward him. "You're acting like a pair of bickering children." He towered over them with his hands on his hips as he glared down at them. "Now hug and make up so I can get back to concentrating on freeing you both."

The two men eyed each other, and Vlad could tell that the other man was just as hesitant about that suggestion as he felt. Neither of them felt any sense of trust toward the other, and for good reason when they were fighting each other over an hour ago.

"I vote against the hug," the white haired man said, his mouth pulling downward as he stared at Vlad.

"Agreed," Vlad said, though they didn't really have that option open anyway since the metal bindings left them unable to actually move their arms, let alone hug each other.

"And I think I finally have this figured out," Jack announced as he held up the handle portion of the device.

"Wait!" the white haired man shouted before Jack could hit the button and free them, at long last, from being trapped together in the metal wires. "I don't trust this guy. Old friend or not, his appearance seems way too coincidental." His green eyes narrowed at Vlad. "Setting him loose might be a bad idea."

Jack frowned, looking rather miserable about his friend not being trusted by this man. "But," he said, and Vlad turned his gaze toward the ceiling before that darn kicked puppy look could affect him like it did in the past, "it's Vladdie."

"Pardon me. But I do believe introductions have failed to be made," Vlad said, addressing Jack as he pointedly ignored the glower from the other man. "Who is this charming young man?"

"You don't need to know my-"

"He's my bodyguard!" Jack answered, talking right over the man's growl.

"Bodyguard?" Vlad questioned, raising an eyebrow at the man who looked like he wanted to smack his forehead if he had the ability to move his arms. "I think you should get your money back, Jack. He's far too young to have enough experience to be a bodyguard for anyone." He allowed the smirk to cross his face this time, amused by the furious scowl on the man's face.

"You'd be surprised. He's-"

"I still think we shouldn't trust him blindly," the bodyguard said forcibly, shooting a look at Jack, who frowned at being cut off by the man. "Just because he was your friend, that doesn't mean he isn't here for ulterior motives. Get the cuffs."

"I hardly think that's necessary," Jack mumbled.

"If he's here as a friend," the bodyguard turned his glare onto Vlad, and a cocky little smirk appeared upon his face, "then he shouldn't mind proving it and allowing us to cuff him." He glanced back at Jack. "I'm here to protect you. If he turns out to be one of the hired assassins, and I let him get away with it, I'll never forgive myself."

Vlad frowned as he watched the expression on the bodyguard's face. Something passed through his green eyes that Vlad couldn't quite identify, but the man seemed to be taking the job a little more personally than a professional bodyguard should. "Well, if that's the only way I'm getting out of this," he wiggled just slightly, jerking the bodyguard around with the movement and gaining another glower, "then I suppose I'll just have to suffer being handcuffed." He sighed, overdoing it a bit on purpose as he blew his breath right into the bodyguard's face. It would be a nuisance to be handcuffed, but they wouldn't be too difficult to escape from, once he was alone.

Jack still looked hesitant about the idea, but he reluctantly walked over to a table set along one side of the laboratory. When he returned, he held a pair of handcuffs in his hand. They didn't look like normal handcuffs, not made of standard silver metal. These handcuffs were made of white metal with a thin blue wire connecting the two cuffs.

"I'm really sorry about this," Jack said to Vlad, looking very regretful about having to handcuff his friend.

Rage burned under the calm mask that Vlad wore. Did Jack feel that regretful when the Proto Portal exploded in his friend's face? When Jack hit the release button, the metal wires loosened around the two men then zipped back into the handle that Jack still held. Vlad stumbled back a step, finally able to breathe a bit easier now that he wasn't crushed against the bodyguard. Then he heard the snap of the handcuff latching around his wrist. With a sigh, he held out his other hand, prepared to suffer being handcuffed. For the time being. But he blinked in surprise when Jack slapped the other end of the handcuff around the bodyguard's wrist.

"Just to be certain you don't try anything funny," the bodyguard explained with a victorious smirk.

Vlad resisted the urge to roll his eyes. The victory was far from decided at that point. Vlad only needed to kill Jack to get his job done, but the bodyguard had to constantly defend against attacks. He might think he won the battle, but the bodyguard only held off the inevitable.

"I have no idea what you mean," Vlad said, staring blandly at the man to whom he was now attached. "I was merely coming to visit an old friend."

"See? Didn't I tell you?" Jack threw his arms around the two men, drawing them in close for crushing one armed hugs. Neither of the men were very happy with the hugs, but Jack was, as usual, oblivious. "Are you hungry? I sure am! I think Maddie left some of her sausages in the fridge before she left." Jack eagerly led the way out of the laboratory.

"I've got my eye on you," the bodyguard said threateningly, fixing a glare upon Vlad, while they were alone for a brief moment before they entered the kitchen to join Jack.


	5. Chapter 4

The sausages were... questionable. Vlad discovered this when Jack brought out the Tupperware container, and the sausages quite literally tried to eat _them_ instead. Jack laughed it off uneasily with a comment about Maddie probably mixing up the ectoplasm samples again while cooking after the struggle to dispose of them without being bitten. It was a gruesome battle that resulted in ground meat splattered all around the kitchen that took quite some time to clean. To save them the hassle of having to cook, as it was already fairly late at night, Jack called up the nearest pizza place and ordered them two large pizzas. Vlad was rather surprised to discover that Jack hadn't forgotten that his favorite pizza was pepperoni and jalapeños. The bodyguard made a face when he heard that combination, expressing his dislike of spicy jalapeños.

The evening probably could have gone a lot worse. Jack carried the conversation for the most part, blathering on exactly how Vlad remembered him. The man could quite seriously talk about anything under the sun, but most of the conversation revolved around the latest in ghost research and inventions that Jack was doing with Maddie. He went on to talk about various achievements that his daughter Jasmine accomplished. She was now at college with plans of going into psychology, which came as no surprise to Jack, apparently, since his daughter was rather adept at psycho analyzing everything. Then Jack went on to ask Vlad about his life, his job, if he was seeing anyone. Vlad was thankful that he took the time to work out a believable background for himself in case a situation came up such as this one. He knew exactly how to respond to each question. His life was going well. He ran a successful business, which if searched for would bring up a few pages about technological endeavors on which his company was working. He had a short string of girlfriends, but none of his relationships lasted over half a year. That, of course, was a complete lie, but it added a more believable element to his story than if he told the truth about never seeing anyone.

Jack seemed to buy the story quite easily, never questioning that any of it was a lie. His bodyguard, on the other hand, watched Vlad with suspicion in his green eyes. Being handcuffed to the man made things awkward with them having to sit closely to each other on the couch while they ate the pizzas. Vlad noted, however, that the bodyguard didn't touch the food, which he found quite curious since the man seemed to eye the overly cheesy slices with longing, like he _really_ wanted to have a slice too.

Vlad sighed tiredly as he sat on the bed in the room that Jack showed him to only moments ago. It looked like a child's room, but not the daughter that Jack mentioned earlier that evening. There were posters hung on the wall of space and something about Dumpty Humpty, though Vlad wasn't sure what that was. A model rocket sat on the desk along one wall with the closet door to the right of it. Nothing about the room suggested the bright woman that studied psychology and had a stuffed bear that resembled Albert Einstein that Jasmine named Bearbert.

The bed shifted, and Vlad felt a jerk on his right wrist as the man leaned back on his hands. An odd expression crossed the bodyguard's face as he stared at the various little things in the room. Did the man miss out on having a normal room like this in his pursuit of becoming a bodyguard? Why would he choose that career, and at such a young age, anyway? Vlad shook those questions from his head. He needed to focus on his assignment, not get distracted over the young bodyguard. Whatever the man's reasons, they weren't any of Vlad's business. Once the man was asleep, Vlad could sneak out of the handcuffs and finish his job. He would have to do something about the bodyguard, though, since the man now knew who Vlad was. He couldn't leave behind anyone that knew his identity. That was an error that go other hit men in trouble. Witnesses could kill an assassin's career. The whole reason Vlad could survive as long as he did in this job was because no one knew his true identity.

"Why do it?" the bodyguard questioned with his gaze remaining on one of the posters.

"Excuse me?" Vlad blinked, not quite following what the man was asking of him.

"Why do you do this job?" The bodyguard tore his gaze away from the poster and turned his curious green eyes onto Vlad.

"This world, unfortunately, requires money to pay for things like food and clothing," Vlad explained with a dry expression. "And to acquire money, one must have a job."

"So to you, it's okay to kill someone as long as it's for money?" The bodyguard frowned, brow drawing together as he glared at the man. "It's okay to take away someone's father and husband because you're making cash off it? What happened in your life to make you think that's okay?"

Vlad lifted his eyebrows, going for a look of surprised confusion. "I haven't the foggiest idea what you mean by that. As I explained to Jack earlier, I'm a business man. I run a company that deals in advancements of technology."

"Just because you say something, that doesn't make it true." The bodyguard leaned in closer, narrowing his eyes like he was trying gaze into Vlad's very soul to find the truth. "I bet you made up those stories about all those girlfriends too. Have you ever even dated anyone?"

"Of course I have!" Vlad snapped quickly, feeling a hint of red creeping along his cheeks.

"Sure." The bodyguard nodded with an obvious, and smug, expression of not believing him.

"And I suppose _you've_ dated hundreds of girls by now?" Vlad scowled, feeling the urge rise in him again to blast the bodyguard.

The bodyguard opened his mouth than turned his head away, frowning as he gazed at the floor. "Why did you have to take this job?"

Vlad moved to lay back on the bed. The sooner the man fell asleep, the sooner Vlad could get his assignment over with and return to his home. "It's already pretty late. Just go to sleep." He closed his eyes, pretending to fall asleep himself.

"I don't sleep."

Vlad cracked one eye open to stare at the man, observing the sad expression upon his face. Moving to sit up on his elbows, he frowned. "Why not?"

"I have to be alert." Green eyes snapped in his direction and glared coldly at him. "Do you honestly think you were the only one hired to assassinate Jack Fenton? Because I can tell you, you weren't the first hit man to drop by the house. And you won't be the last. They'll send more each time their hired gun fails." The bodyguard twisted fully around to face Vlad and seized hold him by the front of his suit. "Who exactly are you working for?"

"As I've said," Vlad sneered as he brushed off the hands holding him, "I'm the president of my own company. I don't work for anyone. And," he lifted his right arm to show the handcuff around his wrist, "what part of this helps in you being alert for any more assassination attempts? I'd just be a handicap for you. You can't fight an intruder while bound to me."

"I also can't allow you to go unwatched. If I weren't here right now, you'd probably be trying to figure out a way to pick the locks on these," the bodyguard waved his left hand, purposely jostling Vlad around with the action, "so that you can go kill Jack. But you'll find these aren't so easy to get off." The man smirked smugly, and Vlad couldn't help but wonder where the man's sense of confidence came from when he constantly seemed to judge his victories prematurely.

"You have a very poor opinion of me." Vlad's mouth thinned. "Perhaps we got off on the wrong foot here earlier. Maybe we should try this again. I'm Vlad Masters." He held out his right hand.

The bodyguard glared at the hand presented before him. "If we got off on the wrong foot, it's because you were trying to kill Jack."

"However you came to that conclusion, I don't think I shall ever understand." Vlad shook his head, displaying disappointment with the man.

"Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that you attacked me."

"Well, can you honestly blame me?" Vlad raised his brow in surprise, like he couldn't believe the bodyguard thought he was some cruel, violent person. "You had a gun to my head. I was merely protecting myself from having my head blown off. Surely, you can understand why I would fight in that situation."

"I have no reason to trust in anything you say." The bodyguard sat back on his legs. He attempted to fold his arms but had a difficult time of it with Vlad's arm attached to him. "Why were you lurking outside if you simply came to visit a friend? Why wouldn't Jack have told me anything about you? There are too many questions without answers when it comes to you."

"First off, I was worried about seeing my old friend again. It has been years after all," Vlad explained, finding it almost too easy to slip into lies. "I might not seem like it in most cases, but even I get nervous over some things. And I honestly see no reason why Jack would have told you anything about me. I doubt he told you about plenty of other friends he has, or had, or about many other details of his life. Why would he? You're merely the bodyguard after all. Your only reason for being here is to protect him. Knowing him on a personal level isn't a requirement of your job."

The smug smirk lasted for about two seconds before a fist slammed into Vlad's face. His head jerked back, hitting the mattress as pain blossomed where he was struck. Vlad clapped a hand over his left eye, thankful that they were on the bed because having his head slam into a wall or the floor would have added to the pain.

"Don't," the bodyguard growled in a voice that had a barely audible waver to it, grabbing a fistful of Vlad's suit as he leaned in close and glared into Vlad's dark blue eyes, " _ever_ presume to know anything about me." He released his hold on Vlad and turned away to keep his vigil. Vlad stared at the back of the man's head, wondering what caused that outburst from the bodyguard. The white haired man didn't seem to be in a talking mood anymore, leaving Vlad's ponderings to go unanswered through the night.


	6. Chapter 5

Morning came before he realized it, golden light filtering in through the open curtains. As he stared at the dull white ceiling above him, Vlad suffered a moment of disorientation. Where was he, he wondered at the unfamiliar surroundings? A child's room - No, more likely a teenager's room, he guessed from the looks of it. Then he recalled the events of the previous night with a sting of pain tingling over his left eye. The bodyguard was deceptive. It wasn't that he appeared weak and feeble so much as he didn't seem like he could throw a punch as hard as he did. Vlad suspected that the white haired man held back some when he punched him last night.

Vlad tossed a tentative glance toward the bodyguard sitting beside him, leaned up against the wall. With his head bowed, his chin rested against his chest, and his green eyes were closed. Deceptive. It repeated in Vlad's mind as he turned his gaze to the handcuff around his wrist. Could he still accomplish his assignment without the bodyguard's notice? Possibly. First, he would need to escape his watcher.

Vlad examined the handcuffs. He possessed nothing on his person that could pick locks. Why would he need to learn such a pedestrian means of escape when he could simply phase himself free of any confinement? He turned his hand and half his forearm intangible, prepared to phase his wrist free of the handcuff, but nothing happened. He tried again and again, at least three more times, with no difference in results. The handcuffs neutralized his ghost powers! But, of course, Jack would posses something of that nature in his arsenal of ghost hunting equipment. Vlad doubted the man would have _normal_ handcuffs. Any panic that rose in him over the thought that Jack or the bodyguard suspected he was half ghost melted away, tension fading from his body. They couldn't know. It was merely coincidence that the handcuffs neutralized his powers. But now he would have to rely on other methods to finish the job. He hadn't prepared for that.

"It's pointless to try getting the handcuffs off," the bodyguard said, his quiet voice disrupting the silence of the morning. A green eye cracked open and stared at Vlad as the man pressed his mouth thin, suspicion clear in his expression.

"I was merely debating how we're going to manage this," Vlad explained holding up his hand with the handcuff attached. "Eventually we'll need to perform certain bodily functions, such as using the restroom. That will be a little difficult while handcuffed to one another."

"I do-" The bodyguard held back his snappy retort then turned his head and sighed. "Yeah, I suppose we should figure out how to deal with that." He climbed off the bed, the movement jerking Vlad's arm when he pulled beyond the handcuffs reach. Once Vlad was on his feet, the man led him out of the bedroom and down the hall toward the bathroom. "I'll wait out here."

Vlad craned his head into the bathroom then turned a frown onto the man. "You can't possibly expect me to reach the toilet while you're standing outside." The toilet was well beyond the reach of the handcuffs. "Just get in there." He dropped his hand onto the man's shoulder, the muscles tensing up immediately upon contact. The bodyguard snapped his gaze toward Vlad, and his green eyes narrowed, body ready to spring like a wild animal about to pounce. Vlad lifted an eyebrow as he pulled his hand a few inches away from the shoulder. "Not much for touching, are you?"

"I'd prefer it if you didn't touch me," the bodyguard growled, baring his teeth like a ferocious beast.

"You two are up early."

Vlad turned to see Jack approaching them with the usual goofy smile upon his face, but Vlad could see the bags under the man's eyes. He frowned at the evidence of how having a hit on him was taking a toll on the man. Jack tried to be his happy self, the big goof ball that Vlad remembered from college, but now it was clearly an act, perhaps even a show of bravery to hide his fears and worries about someone wanting him dead.

Then Jack stopped in his tracks as his gaze fell upon his old college friend, and the smile faded into a frown. "What happened? You didn't have that shiner last night." He folded his arms over his broad chest, wearing once again that orange jumpsuit which he probably never took off. A stern look of disapproval entered his eyes that only made him seem all the more like a father. "Do we all have to sleep in one room to keep everyone from fighting?"

"No," the bodyguard responded, almost sounding like a scolded child rather than the skittish beast which hated to be touched that he appeared to be a moment ago.

Jack's blue eyes narrowed just a touch, like he suspected that the two men were going to continue behaving like bickering children. "Well then, let's get some breakfast." His large hands practically enveloped the whole of Vlad's shoulders as Jack ushered him down the stairs with the bodyguard trailing awkwardly behind them, pulled along by the handcuffs. "I think we have pancake mix somewhere."

"It won't attack us, will it?" Vlad asked skeptically, recalling their fiasco with the sausages last night. The massacre of sausages was a nightmare to clean up, and he didn't look forward to attempting to clean up pancake batter that came alive to try and attack them.

"No way!" Jack chuckled, giving his friend a shake that nearly made Vlad misstep on the stairs and topple down the remainder of the steps. "I hope," he added with some uncertainty, which did little to boost Vlad's confidence. "You two make yourself comfortable. I'll get breakfast started." He walked past Vlad and into the kitchen, leaving the two men alone in the front room.

"Can he even cook?" Vlad turned to the bodyguard as he lifted an eyebrow and frowned. As Vlad recalled from their time living together in college, Jack wasn't the greatest cook in the world, often burning things to a crisp or creating some god awful concoction that left Vlad gagging at the horrible taste.

The bodyguard shrugged, a short lift of his shoulders as he gazed off to the side. "If not, there's cereal or oatmeal."

Vlad's mouth pulled thin as his eyes narrowed a fraction. "How do you plan to do your job well as a bodyguard when you don't eat? You didn't eat any of the pizza last night. You must be hungry by now."

"Now you're concerned for my health?" The bodyguard snapped annoyed green eyes onto him. "According to you, I'm just a mere bodyguard with the sole purpose of protecting my client. My health isn't of any concern."

"If you're supposed to be protecting him, then it _is_ of concern," Vlad argued, keeping his voice low enough that it wouldn't draw Jack's attention to them. Why was he even bothering with this? The man's health mattered very little to him. Once he accomplished his assignment, he would leave and the bodyguard would be forgotten. But the fact that the man didn't eat nagged at him. The man was leanly built and lacked that gaunt appearance of a person that was nothing but skin and bones from not eating properly. Perhaps the bodyguard simply waited until after Jack was asleep before he ate, but that would mean he was forced to skip his usual meal because he was attached to Vlad the whole night. Vlad shouldn't argue the topic. It would be better for him if the man was weakened from hunger.

"You know, you could save us a lot of trouble if you simply told me right now who it is you're working for," the bodyguard stated in a chilly tone, and Vlad swore that the room actually grew a few degrees colder. "Tell me who keeps sending these assassins after D-Jack Fenton, and I can go deal with them myself." His green eyes burned into Vlad as he waited for the answer. An answer that would allow him to strike at the one trying to kill Jack.

"I wish I could tell you what you want to know." Vlad shrugged, staring blandly back at the young man, not intimidated by the anger he displayed. He honestly knew nothing about the people that employed him. It was better that way, on the off chance that he did get captured and interrogated for answers, he wouldn't be able to expose his employers. It never became an issue, of course, until now. "But I'm just your average business man. I know nothing about assassins."

"I don't believe you."

"That's unfortunate for you, but I can't tell you what I don't know." Vlad ignored the scowl from the man as he wandered about the front room. On the coffee table before the couch, he found a photo album that was left open. Did Jack come down in the middle of the night to look at it? Vlad was certain it wasn't there last night when they were eating their pizza. Taking a seat on the couch, he stared at the pictures on the pages to which the album was opened. Jack and Maddie were easily recognizable though the pictures were from a number of years ago. A young girl was featured in some of them, usually with a book in her hands. Her long auburn hair fell in long waves, and her aqua colored eyes gleamed with a curious light. She was obviously Jazz, the daughter Jack mentioned last night. Then Vlad frowned when he noticed a fourth person in the pictures. He was a young boy, perhaps a year or two younger than their daughter. He had a shock of raven hair and bright blue eyes. There was one picture of him with sitting in Maddie's lap as they stared up at the stars above them. Jack never mentioned this boy, but he must be their son. It explained the bedroom in which Vlad and the bodyguard slept. But why would Jack say nothing about his son?

"You shouldn't be looking through other people's stuff," the bodyguard said as he slammed the album shut when Vlad reached to flip the page.

"I'm sure Jack wouldn't mind if I looked at it." Vlad lifted his brows curiously as the man kept his hand firmly on the album, refusing to allow Vlad the chance to open it again. Something flickered in his green eyes, but Vlad couldn't quite determine what that look was.

"Breakfast is ready," Jack called from the kitchen where Vlad could smell the slightest hint of something burning.

Getting up from the couch, Vlad followed the bodyguard into the kitchen where Jack was setting a large plate of pancakes in the center of the table. Some of them were charred, ringed about the edges with blackness. Those pancakes didn't look very appetizing, but not all of them were burnt.

"I know they didn't all come out that great," Jack said, rubbing his neck with some embarrassment. If he looked really closely at the man, Vlad thought he saw some evidence that the man cried recently though he covered it up pretty well. "I haven't had reason to make pancakes for a while." Jack grabbed the syrup and brought it over to the table. "Well, sit down! Dig in!" He grinned cheekily as he sat at the head of the table, piling some of the pancakes onto his plate.

Vlad and the bodyguard joined him, though Vlad wrinkled his nose as he picked up some of the pancakes to drop on his plate. He tried to pick out the ones that were the least burnt from the pile. Glancing at the bodyguard, he frowned when he noticed the man simply sitting there and watching them eat. He scooped up a stack of pancakes and added them to another plate that he set before the man. Stunned and confused green eyes stared at him like he suddenly grew a second head.

"A bodyguard needs his strength to protect someone," Vlad stated simply before focusing his attention on his breakfast, scraping away as much of the charred edges as possible.


	7. Chapter 6

Too much time ticked past, and Vlad grew anxious. He should have finished his object by now, his employers likely becoming more frustrated at his lack of action with each passing moment. Another assassin would be on his way to take out the target, and Vlad would get stuck in the crossfire if he wasn't careful. He needed to finish the job and get out of town before another hit man could arrive or questions were asked.

But the bodyguard kept too watchful an eye upon him at all times. This was made easier for him by the fact that they remained linked at the wrists to each other. Jack adjusted the handcuffs that first morning after breakfast to allow more range between them, which was a relief as it meant Vlad was able to use the bathroom with some privacy. The bodyguard never seemed to require use of the bathroom, another curious little detail that picked at Vlad's brain. The man still showed reluctance to eat in front of the other two men, and Vlad didn't miss the amusement that sometimes flickered through Jack's eyes when he watched the bodyguard. But more importantly, Jack always gazed at the bodyguard with curiosity, a thirst for more knowledge that usually only came over the man whenever the topic of ghosts was brought up in conversation.

His dark blue eyes slid toward the bodyguard standing at most two feet away from him as they both leaned up against the wall in the laboratory of the house. They played the game for a week now with the bodyguard demanding answers of him and Vlad feigning innocent of being the accused assassin that the man believed him to be, and Jack would shoot them looks, that commanding, fatherly expression of sternness that was used on misbehaving children.

The bodyguard didn't sleep or eat or have any need to perform bodily functions. The unnatural white hair and his bright green eyes started making sense to him as the thought sneaked into Vlad's brain. The bodyguard wasn't even human. He was a ghost. It explained why the temperature in the room would drop if the man grew angry. His experience with ghosts told Vlad one thing: they worked by obsession. Their entire being revolved about one strong thought that allowed their consciousness to coalesce into a physical manifestation made up of ectoplasm. Vlad used his superior power and knowledge to drive fear into the weaker ghosts that would do his bidding. They were far easier to manipulate that way.

But what obsession would cause a ghost to be the bodyguard for a human? And more importantly a ghost hunter? Why would Jack even allow a ghost to _be_ his bodyguard? That hardly made any sense to Vlad when Jack and Maddie were avid ghost hunters that usually shot first and dissected the remains for answers. How would the ghost get close enough to the Fentons without being attacked to even offer to be a bodyguard?

Vlad's eyes narrowed as the questions piled up in his head. And why couldn't he sense the ghost at all? Usually, he would feel a chill run through him whenever another ghost was present in the same vicinity. What stopped him from recognizing this man as a ghost from the beginning?

"What?" the bodyguard snapped quietly as he shot angry eyes at Vlad. His mouth pulled thin, his jaw set like he ground his teeth hard in his annoyance.

"I said nothing," Vlad replied calmly with indifference on his face. He turned his gaze onto Jack, who was currently busily working on his latest project. His tongue protruded from the corner of his mouth, and his brow creased in deep concentration. Working on inventions was the only time Vlad could recall seeing a serious side of Jack. The big man rarely seemed to put in that kind of effort while studying for school, but somehow he always managed to pull out solid Cs throughout college, which Vlad found irksome at times. He always had to bust his butt to make good grades while Jack seemed to simply float by with little effort.

Vlad's hands closed tightly around his arms as anger coursed through his veins like a fire. Jack seemed to have everything. All the things to Vlad wished he could have but never had the chance to achieve. Jack didn't need to work hard to succeed, though he seemed to make only a modest living while Vlad sat on a nice little trove of wealth thanks to his work as a hit man. Jack stole Maddie's heart, which still felt like a slap in Vlad's face. Jack had children, a smart daughter and a son- Vlad frowned as the memory of the boy in the pictures flashed through his mind. A son that Jack wouldn't talk about.

When the doorbell echoed through the house, Jack ripped his gaze away from his invention, turning his head to stare up the stairs of the laboratory. A sigh passed between slightly parted lips as Jack set down his screwdriver and stood. "I guess it is time for a break," he mumbled, heading up the stairs. "We passed lunch already."

Vlad blinked, only realizing it then that it was well into the afternoon and they spent the day in the laboratory since right after breakfast. He climbed the stairs behind the larger man, dragging the bodyguard along with him as they entered the kitchen. Jack left the room and walked toward the front door to see who rang the doorbell.

"You've been quiet today," Vlad noted his observation as he stared at the bodyguard. Quiet wasn't the only term he would use to describe the man's unusual attitude. Agitated, distracted, distant. Something was definitely different compared to the previous days. When Vlad put food before the man as usual that morning, the bodyguard refused to touch anything on the plate while before, he would reluctantly eat a few bites at the very least.

The bodyguard stared at him before his eyes narrowed slightly and he twisted his head away from Vlad. "No, I haven't. It's nothing." Lies. Deception. What was this ghost planning?

"Hi, Mr. Fenton." The woman's voice came from the front hall, and Vlad glanced toward the kitchen door. Her voice sounded like a young woman, probably not even twenty yet, and Vlad's brow wrinkled with curiosity over the woman visiting Jack. Out of the corner of his eye, Vlad could see the bodyguard tense up when he heard her voice.

"What are you two doing here?" Jack asked with a frown in his voice. "Shouldn't you still be at school?"

"We have last period free." It was a man this time that spoke, and the bodyguard remained tense as he turned away from the kitchen doorway. "We wanted, um-" Hesitation was in the young man's voice.

"What Tucker means, is we wanted to come pay our respects," the woman continued when her friend fell quiet.

"My mom made that fudge you like," Tucker announced, his fingers tapping on the tin containing said fudge.

"My mom even helped this year," the woman interrupted.

"Um, it's been four years, but um, how are you and Mrs. Fenton holding up?" Tucker gave a grunt, and Vlad imagined the woman elbowed him for asking something that insensitive. "Sorry," he mumbled quietly.

"It's fine," Jack said, but his voice held a strained note to it. "We're fine. Maddie went to visit her sister, but it's fine." Despite all his reassurances, anyone listening to him would know right off the bat that he was _not_ fine. But what were the three of them referring to?

Vlad puzzled over that question as he shifted his gaze to the bodyguard. Muscles taut, gaze downturned, mouth pulled thin; a flash of pain danced in his bright green eyes. What was that reaction to the conversation taking place down the hall? Vlad frowned as he gave the bodyguard a critical look as he examined these cracks in the usual tough persona the man tried to project outwardly.

"We were going to visit the grave," the woman said uncertainly. "Did you want us to-"

Vlad tuned out the rest of their conversation as his eyes widened a fraction, his attention focused solely on the bodyguard and the way the color drained completely from his face when the woman mentioned the grave. The pieces all started clicking into place. He knew why the ghost would be obsessed with protecting Jack.

"You're their son," Vlad said quietly, not even questioning it as he stepped closer to the bodyguard. Green eyes snapped toward him, fear washing through them giving him the impression of a scared child. Vlad glanced him over, noting every inch of the bodyguard with a grim expression. "You died, but your family and friends don't know that you became a ghost?" How did Jack not recognize his own son's ghost? Vlad still hadn't found an answer for why he didn't pick up the bodyguard's ghostly essence. "Why haven't you said anything?" He wasn't supposed to want to know the answer to that. He wasn't supposed to care about this unfortunate ghost. But this bodyguard was Jack's son. He was _Maddie's_ son. Even if he had anger issues with Jack, Vlad still cared a great deal for Maddie. That, if nothing else, made him care about the ghost.

The bodyguard acted too quickly for Vlad to respond as his hands seized the front of Vlad's suit, fisting tightly around what was usually neatly pressed fabric. He drove forward, slamming Vlad into the kitchen wall. His eyes glowed unnaturally, and despite that initial gut reaction of fear, Vlad wondered even more how he didn't notice the bodyguard was a ghost from the beginning as he stared into those furious eyes. The room grew colder, yet again baffling Vlad about how he didn't connect that common response to an angry ghost.

"Don't you dare," the bodyguard ordered in a voice that wavered despite any attempt to keep it strong and firm, "say _anything_. I will," he growled through bared, clenched teeth, " _end_ you."

Fierce anger, intimidating to most, but Vlad merely stared back evenly at the ghost that couldn't hide the hurt and pain hinting behind the rage. Being in this house, being around his family but remaining unknown to them must be hard for the young ghost. Even with all his work as a hit man and employing ghosts, Vlad still spent most of his time since the accident in college alone. He could only imagine the pain was much harder to bear if he lived for twenty plus years haunting his old friends.

"What exactly should I call you?" Vlad inquired curiously, lifting an eyebrow at the ghost. "I assume you don't go by your human name around your parents."

The ghostly bodyguard blinked, almost looking taken aback by Vlad's blasé response to learning his true identity. His eyes squinted, like he was having trouble determining Vlad's game in asking for his name. If he thought to be polite earlier, they would have exchanged formal introductions, but in the rush of events and with Jack's dominating personality, they didn't have much of an opportunity.

The ghost's posture relaxed, the white knuckled grip he held on Vlad loosening. The anger melted, replaced by cold hardness as the ghost's mouth pulled tight across his face. He dropped his arms away from the man's body, giving Vlad the chance to smooth out his suit.

"I go by Phantom now. And four years ago today, I died."


	8. Chapter 7

"How did it happen?" Vlad questioned as they sat alone in the front room of the house. After that punch to the gut when Phantom announced his death, that nearly left Vlad gasping for air, the rest of the day passed quietly with Jack focusing solely on his work, treating the others like they weren't even there. They ate their dinner in silence, Vlad taking it upon himself to cook it to avoid another burnt meal. Jack went up to bed immediately after they finished washing up the dishes, and Vlad didn't miss the misery in his eyes. Today, the jolly goofball that Vlad knew so well was gone, replaced by a gloomy soul that Vlad hardly recognized. He realized, watching the man all day, that he hated seeing Jack like that. It was strange to think that after feeling anger toward him for so many years, but there it was, unexpected as it was.

"I'm not talking about it," Phantom muttered, continuing his refusal to even look at Vlad after his secret was discovered. If he noticed anything odd between the pair, Jack was far too lost in his own thoughts to comment on it. Vlad couldn't blame the man for his depressed mood when he thought of how much it must hurt the man to think his son lost forever. Yet here he was, sitting on the couch in the front room of Fenton Works. If he tried to imagine the boy from the pictures aged up, Vlad could almost see the ghost being the same person, if he looked at Phantom with raven hair and blue eyes.

"Your parents don't recognize you," Vlad stated simply like commenting on the weather.

"I'm a ghost," Phantom said, almost biting out the word. The corners of his eyes crinkled, and his jaw clenched, the only changes in his expression that he couldn't stop from showing. "They don't want to see what I really look like. In their eyes, I'm just an evil presence that eventually needs to be eradicated."

"Which brings up the question: how did you manage to convince them to allow you to be their bodyguard?" Vlad raised his eyebrows, gazing upon the ghost with great curiosity. "It certainly couldn't have been an easy task with the way they attack first and never give the ghost a chance to explain."

Phantom's hands curled just a touch tighter about his biceps. "No," he agreed, "it wasn't easy. Before becoming a bodyguard, I used my powers to protect Amity Park from other ghosts. Ever since-" He stopped, shaking his head like what he was going to say was unimportant. "There hasn't been very much ghostly activity recently, but there's enough to keep me busy. My parents, of course, didn't care if I was trying to help protect the town or not. I was another ghost, and whatever my motives, they couldn't be good in their minds. Then a few months ago, the first assassin struck. I foiled their attempt, but protecting Dad didn't exactly prove I was 'good.' After a few more attacks and a few more rescues, they finally had to admit that maybe I wasn't as big a threat." He actually turned his gaze onto Vlad, green eyes sharp. "Compared to other ghosts, that is. They still don't trust me. Not really. But we made a deal. I act as bodyguard, keeping Dad safe from assassination attempts, and they get to run a few experiments on me."

"What?" Vlad shouted in outrage, eyes very nearly shifting to red before he managed to control it. He couldn't even begin to imagine the horror, the pain, of having his parents experiment on him. His eyes remained wide, holding the ghost's gaze, as he tried to grasp what Phantom went through but failing to understand how the ghost could allow his parents to do it.

"Dissection is, of course, off the table," Phantom explained in a dull, lifeless tone. "I'll let them test weapons on me and take small samples of ectoplasm to study, but I'm certainly not allowing them to cut me open or slice off bits of my body." He shuddered, a dark look passing through his eyes. If the ghost were to sleep, Vlad could only imagine his dreams were filled with nightmares of his parents leaning over him with sharp implements as they prepared to cut into him and see what made him tick. It was a thought that made Vlad wary of ever telling his old friends about his ghost powers.

Silence stretched for several minutes as the information digested in his head. "Do you ever plan to tell them the truth?"

Phantom turned his head away, deadness in his eyes. "Once I know Dad is safe, I'll go back to the Ghost Zone. It's where I belong."

"It's where you-" Vlad snapped, ready to rant, but he clamped his mouth shut as he turned to stare across the room. Maybe the Ghost Zone was where he belonged too. After all, he wasn't really living in the real world. He did his job as a hit man, but that was all his life was. He had no joys that he experienced. He existed in the real world, but he was, and always had been since the accident, half dead. His mouth pulled thin as he disagreed in his head with that statement. He wasn't half dead. He was fully dead but able to wear the mask of still being half alive.

A loud noise, like a body hitting the wall, came from upstairs, and they both snapped their heads toward the stairs.

"Dad," Phantom whispered, green eyes growing wide with panic. In a flash, he was off the couch and racing for the stairs, pulling Vlad along behind him as the man struggled to keep up without stumbling and being dragged upon the floor. Going up the stairs would have hurt with a bang at each step.

Vlad didn't even need to guess what thoughts were going through the ghost's head because he was thinking them too, though with much less panic. Who could be attacking Jack now? Another assassin, that was clear. But how did the assassin get into the house without them noticing? Vlad was fairly good at being aware of his surroundings at all times, and he imagined that Phantom became accustom to being alert for any sneak attacks by hit men. Anger coursed through him, his hands curling tightly as his teeth clenched and his eyes narrowed, a hint of red shifting into the usual dark blue. He couldn't allow another assassin to kill his mark.

When they reached the upstairs hall, Phantom dropped to his knees checking his father's vital signs as the large man leaned up against the wall. Jack didn't look too good with his face looking swollen and the wheezing, rattling breaths that he gasped in through barely parted lips like his lungs struggled to expand wide enough to take a full breath. Vlad scanned the hall, but he saw no sign of anyone breaking in to make the attack. Whoever the culprit was, they were good. Vlad's hands clenched tighter in frustrated that a hit man managed to strike right under his nose.

"He's been poisoned!" Phantom shouted, drawing Vlad's attention back to the ghost. His hands scrambled around inside the pockets of Jack's orange jumpsuit which he merely threw a baby blue night shirt over, proving Vlad's assumption that the man never took off the jumpsuit. When Phantom pulled out his hand and held it up, Vlad immediately recognized the key to the handcuffs. The ghost stood up with a serious expression on his face, his hand closed tightly around the key. "I'm only removing these because I can get him to the hospital a lot fast if I fly there, and that will go even faster if I'm not struggling with both of you." His mouth pursed as he held Vlad's gaze. "I know this gives you the chance to run, but if you care even a little, we'll be at Amity General."

The click of the handcuffs unlocking echoed in his ears as Vlad stared down at his wrist where the white metal had wrapped about it like a hideous bracelet for what now felt like months rather than a little over a week. He rubbed at his wrist, finding the sudden absence of the handcuff a strange sensation. When the handcuff was first slapped onto his wrist, Vlad expected to have a miserable experience attached to the bodyguard, but it was surprisingly not as bad as he thought. A smile almost tugged at the corners of his mouth as he reflected on their banter, toying with the young ghost as he pretended to be the innocent business man.

The ghost vanished from sight, carrying Jack off in a hurry to the hospital in the desperate hope that he wasn't too late to save his father from the effects of the poison. A moment alone to himself, and Vlad stood there pondering what to do. He was given the perfect opportunity to make his escape, disappear, and return to make his assassination attempt under the guise of the ghost known as Plasmius.

"Why do you do this job?"

Vlad frowned as the question from that first night sprung back to the forefront of his mind. He could still recall quite clearly those curious green eyes staring at him, searching for an answer, a explanation to understand why Vlad killed people for a living. Why, he didn't know the answer to that question. The money hardly mattered since he really didn't need his wealth for anything. He didn't take some sick pleasure in stealing away a life. It was a job and nothing more. But why did he do it? Why did he take away people's loved ones for money? He couldn't find an answer inside him to give Phantom, and more importantly to give himself.

Maddie already lost her son. Did he want to hurt her further by taking away her husband?

With his fists clenched, Vlad changed into his ghost form for the first time in over a week. Once he turned invisible, he flew off toward the hospital. It didn't take him long to find Amity General, as it was the nearest hospital to Fenton Works, but Vlad touched down several blocks away from it. He didn't want to get too close to the hospital while in his ghost form, in case Phantom picked up on his signature. With a safe location picked out, he reverted back to human, adjusting his suit and smoothing back his hair. Then he stepped out into public view and made his way toward the hospital, slowly by foot.

Did Phantom make it to the hospital in time to save Jack? Vlad ground his teeth, the strange hope that Jack would live rising in him. After years of being angry at his old friend, years of blaming his unhappiness on the man, Vlad shouldn't suddenly care about whether Jack lived or died, and he certainly shouldn't be praying for the man's survival.

When he reached Amity General, Vlad went in search of Phantom. Even after the display of ghostly abilities, Vlad still couldn't sense the ghost at all. What was his secret there? Had he learned some way to suppress his energies? It would be a handy skill to come by if Phantom did manage to learn it. What better way to hide from ghost tracking devices than to erase the signature that the inventions tracked?

Vlad found Phantom as the ghost paced the waiting area on another floor, looking overly distraught after finding his father dying from poison. The ghost had a thumb to his mouth, chewing at a nail as his legs carried him about the small space without much thought. Vlad frowned as he stood there silently and watched the ghost for several minutes. His chest hurt, an unusual pang squeezing inside it. Phantom might be a ghost, but he clearly still felt like a human, agonizing over the possibility of losing his father. Losing Jack for good since not everyone turned into a ghost after death.

"You're a very strange ghost," Vlad commented, not worried about exposing the ghost's identity since no one was around in the waiting area to overhear them.

Phantom paused in midstride and turned his head. His eyes widened when they landed on Vlad. "You didn't run." He blinked, utterly stunned by that simple fact.

"I didn't run," Vlad agreed with a simple nod.


	9. Chapter 8

Jack was going to be fine. The doctor approached them in the waiting room to announce that they got Jack to the hospital in time so that they could identify the mystery poison and work out an antidote in time to save him. Phantom collapsed into a chair, which couldn't be very comfortable with the barely an inch thick cushion, as he pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes and released a relieved sigh. The tension melted out of him when he heard what the doctor had to say, and he suddenly looked a thousand times more exhausted, weariness written over every inch of his body. Phantom was a scared teenager. A scared teenager desperately trying to keep his father from dying.

When they were alone again, Vlad sat down beside him, and his guess about the chairs proved correct but he ignored how uncomfortable the chair was as he laid a hand upon the ghost's shoulder. "You saved him," he said, and the gentle hint sounded strange in his own ears. How was it that he felt so relieved to hear that Jack was going to live? But the answer to that could come later. Right now, Phantom looked like he could use the emotional support, and Vlad was the only one that knew the truth about him.

"This time." Bitterness tinged his voice as Phantom lifted his head from his hands. "But there's still another assassin out there. Once he realizes he failed, he'll try again." His green eyes narrowed at Vlad. "And then they'll send another assassin. And another." Phantom dropped his gaze to his hands and curled them into tight fists. "I won't be able to keep up with them forever. Ghost or not, there's only so much I can do. Eventually, one of them is going to find a way to kill Dad. Look how close this one came to succeeding?"

Vlad frowned, the grim realization of what the ghost said sinking in at that moment. He knew his lack of action, his failure to accomplish his assignment, would prompt his employer to hire a new hit man to finish the job. But he only thought about it from his own selfish prospective. A new assassin meant someone else to compete with to finish off his mark. Now he thought on it from Phantom's point of view, thought about how the ghost always had to think about whom was lurking in the shadows and waiting to strike, and how he probably suspected everyone he saw as being a potential hit man laying in wait. Phantom didn't get to rest. He didn't have that privilege when his father's life was on the line.

"You," Phantom said, hesitation in his eyes as he frowned, "didn't poison him, right?" Hope tried to make an appearance, but the ghost was already preparing himself for the sting of betrayal.

Vlad returned the curious look with a dull glare. "You were attached to me the entire time. You oversaw everything I did while in the house. How could I _possibly_ have slipped poison into anything he ate or drank with you watching me like a hawk?"

Phantom opened his mouth then frowned as he turned his gaze away from Vlad. "No," he agreed miserably, and Vlad realized it would be so much easier on the ghost if he _was_ the one that poisoned Jack. If it was Vlad, Phantom would already know the culprit and wouldn't have worry about uncovering the new assassin's identity. "I suppose it couldn't be you." He bent his head down, raking his hands through his snow white hair. "Who could it have been? How did they manage to poison him? The doctor said there was no signs of it being injecting into him, so he must have ingested it somehow. But how? He doesn't eat anything that comes from outside the house. I check over everything just in case of poison."

"Was there anything different today?" Vlad inquired, also trying to puzzle out how this other hit man managed to deliver the poison that Jack ingested. When Phantom turned his gaze onto him, eyebrows lifting, Vlad sighed. "Other than I cooked dinner tonight."

Phantom sighed, brow creasing as he thought long and hard about the question. "It was pretty much an ordinary day." He shrugged, a small roll of one shoulder. "We ate breakfast as usual. Lunch was small, but nothing unusual. You made dinner, but you couldn't have slipped in poison while I was watching your every move."

"It wasn't entirely an ordinary day." Vlad's mouth curled downward. This probably wasn't the most appropriate time to bring it up, not after the scare of Jack nearly dying from poison. "It was the anniversary of your death."

Wide eyed and mouth dropping open, Phantom gaped at him. "You can't possibly be suggesting that Sam and Tucker tried to kill Dad!" He shot to his feet, rage surging forward to replace the shock. "My friends like my parents. They would never try to kill him. Not for money!"

"I was friends with your parents," Vlad reminded him, but the circumstances were far different. He doubted that two young teenagers would take up the life of an assassin and kill their friend's parent after said friend died. "Right now, they're the odd piece in the puzzle. They're what's different about today."

"My friends have no reason to-" Phantom halted, the rage suddenly vanishing as his eyes grew a touch wider. Something occurred to him. Something about what took place when his friends visited registered in his head. He spun on his feet and darted down the hall.

Vlad's eyes followed after him, confusion spinning in his mind. What thought about the assassination attempt hit Phantom? He couldn't be of help if he was left in the dark! Did he want to be of help? Climbing to his feet and hurrying to follow the ghost, Vlad forced himself to admit that yes, he did want to help. He couldn't believe he wanted to help Jack, of all people after what happened in the past, but if it meant Maddie would be happy, if it meant that Phantom wouldn't be sad, Vlad would offer his services to help.

"Just let me see who's working tonight!" Phantom shouted at the nurse behind the desk. The woman, with her blonde hair pulled back into a low ponytail, had bags under her wide, frightened eyes. Phantom desperately wanted the information, somehow it would help him with answers about the assassin, but he went about it the wrong way. The nurse stuttered, unable to work out a response to the ghost.

"Excuse me," Vlad said, placing a calming hand upon Phantom's shoulder as he took a glance at the woman's nametag, "Isabella." His most charming smile stretched over his face, the type he used when he wanted to win over someone into divulging information to him. The woman visibly relaxed as she turned her attention onto him rather than the anxious and scary ghost beside him. "It would be _enormously_ helpful to us if you would allow us to see the list of workers on shift tonight."

"Oh, yes, of course!" Isabella quickly typed in a few keystrokes into the computer before her. Then, with a pleasant smile, she turned the screen around to face them. Fear could be a great tool to bending someone to his will, but Vlad knew quite well that sometimes charm went a lot further to helping his cause.

"Thank you, Isabella," Vlad said politely while beside him, Phantom scanned through the list of names.

"There!" Phantom shouted as he jabbed a finger at one of the names on the screen.

Vlad leaned over for a better look. "Pamela Manson?" He blinked then turned lifted eyebrows onto the ghost.

"That's Sam's mom," Phantom explained like it should be enough for Vlad to understand everything, except that Vlad remained perplexed by the significance of it. "I knew she worked at this hospital, but I didn't think it was important. And then - Argh!" Phantom grabbed chunks of his hair and yanked on them in frustration.

"Hey," Vlad said, his voice controlled as he placed his hands on the ghost's shoulders. "Breathe!" That was a strange thing to say to a ghost, he realized, but he needed Phantom to calm down and explain things to him. "What's the significance of her working here?"

Phantom actually took a breath, inhaled deeply as his eyes closed for a brief moment. The tension relaxed in shoulders but didn't completely fade. He calmed his anxiety but remained on guard. When he opened his eyes, the chaos of panic evaporated, leaving behind a calculating look of a mind slipping all the pieces into place to see the full picture. "The Mansons are a wealthy family. They like normal things. They were always trying to force Sam into wearing girly dresses. Pink with floral print. Sam always hated it. She liked to be an individual and hated that her mother always wanted to force her to be like all the other girls. Her parents especially hated my parents. My parents were the crazy kooks that believed in ghosts. They always thought that I was a terrible influence on Sam, like somehow I'd rub off my parents' craziness onto her and drag her into a bad crowd that would lead her to a bad life." He rolled his eyes then grabbed hold of Vlad's arms. "Don't you get it? Don't you remember what Sam said when she and Tuck visited? Her mother helped make the fudge this year! Her _mother_! Why would her mother help make anything for someone that she hates?"

Vlad's mouth dropped, and he didn't care if he looked ridiculous with his mouth gaping open. It was a perfect plan really, when he looked at from the prospective of an assassin. She could easily slip some poison into the fudge, which anyone that knew Jack would know he loved. Then she used her own daughter as a tool to deliver the unsuspecting tainted treats. Neither Phantom nor Vlad even touched any of the fudge. Vlad never particularly cared for fudge, and Jack always seemed so happy whenever Vlad gave up his portion to his friend. In this case, the poison met its intended target without any casualties of innocents that accidentally sampled the fudge.

"And she works here," Vlad mumbled numbly as that point really sank in for him.

"In case the poison didn't kill him," Phantom agreed grimly. "She would have the chance here, under the guise of a nurse checking on a patient, to try a second time to kill him." He kept a hold on Vlad's arm as he turned to run down the hall toward the room where Jack was recovering after the poisoning.

Jack was too trusting a person. Even if he were awake after what he went through, he wouldn't suspect anything if this Pamela Manson woman came into his room to "check on him." He could be completely blind to someone hating him, and with the woman being the mother of his son's friend, Jack wouldn't believe her capable of trying to kill him. His obliviousness to some things could, indeed, one day get him killed.

Phantom released his hold on Vlad's arm as he rushed into the hospital room. He took a stumbling step toward the bed then dropped to his knees, taking hold of Jack's hand in both of his own. Vlad remained in the doorway, giving Phantom a moment with his father as the beeping of the heart monitor filled the silence of the room. If Pamela Manson planned to make a second attempt on Jack's life, she hadn't gone through with it yet. A laugh almost tried to bubble out of Vlad, a hysterical laugh of relief that his old friend was alive and well. Pamela Manson wouldn't get another chance to kill Jack, not with Phantom and Vlad to stand in her way of accomplishing her assignment.


	10. Chapter 9

They stayed up the entire night to keep watch over Jack. When Pamela Manson passed the open doorway of Jack's room, Phantom pointed her out in a quiet whisper. Vlad eyed the woman, sizing her up as an assassin. She looked far to prim and proper for the usual hit men that Vlad saw from time to time. Her auburn hair, cut short, curled under at the chin without a single hair out of place. Vlad wrinkled his nose when he noted the string of pearls about her neck and the diamonds hanging from her earrings that he was almost certain were real. Phantom informed him that Sam's father was the heir to a great fortunate, but Pamela wouldn't need to marry wealthy with the money she made from hits.

Vlad glanced sideways at Phantom during a lull in the early morning. If she got pregnant, Pamela might have decided to retire as a hit man to raise her daughter. Marrying wealthy meant she could hide her money without anyone questioning how she made her living prior to the marriage. If she did in fact retire, her hatred for Jack must have driven her into accepting the job.

They pretended like they weren't on to her, deciding that it would be best to keep her thinking that she was in the clear still and could plan another attempt on Jack's life. They would be ready for whatever she did. Phantom wasn't much in the mood for talking. When he wasn't whispering facts about Pamela Manson to Vlad, Phantom paced about the room, chewing on his thumbnail. It wasn't that same anxious worry about the poison killing his father like when Vlad first arrived at the hospital. This time, Phantom's eyes held a calculating look in them. He was thinking about everything he knew regarding the hit men and their attacks. He tried to connect them, look for patterns, but more importantly he was searching for a way to uncover their employer's identity. Finding out whom wanted Jack Fenton dead would be a great help to the ghost, and Vlad wished he could give the man the answer he wanted.

"Well, it seems you're in perfect health," Doctor Walder announced after running through a check up on Jack.

"Of course!" Jack grinned widely as he patted a hand on his broad chest. "Mom always told me I was as healthy as an ox." Thankfully, Pamela Manson wasn't the nurse that joined Doctor Walder as they examined Jack. Isabella from the desk smiled shyly at Vlad as she held out the chart for Doctor Walder. Pamela Manson likely decided that it was best to wait for an opportunity when Jack didn't have two alert guards to watch over her target.

"We have a few papers that need to be signed before you can be released, Mr. Fenton," Doctor Walder said, flipping through some of the pages on the chart before turning his brown eyes onto his patient.

"I can sign for them," Phantom said, pushing away from the wall. "Uh, why don't you help Jack get dressed, Vlad?"

When their eyes met, Vlad could immediately read that look of trust in Phantom's green eyes. Before last night, Phantom wouldn't have trusted his father alone with Vlad, a suspected hit man, but he did now. Vlad didn't know why that filled him with a small swell of pride. He nodded, and a smile pulled at Phantom's mouth before he turned to follow the doctor and nurse from the hospital room. Vlad closed the door after them, allowing for some privacy for his old friend.

"I won't tell."

"What?" Vlad twisted around at the voice.

Jack wasn't wearing his usual jolly face, and the seriousness in his expression unsettled Vlad. "I won't tell Maddie. That you came here to kill me."

"I would never-"

"Vlad," Jack cut off the protest with a narrowing of his eyes and firmness in his voice. "You know I'm not a complete idiot, even though I act like it a lot of the time." He pushed the thin cover of the bed down as he threw his legs over the edge of the bed. "I knew there was some other reason for why you came here. You haven't spoken to me in over twenty years. Obviously, you came to Amity Park for a different reason than to visit me." He pushed himself to his feet, almost gave a sway, but kept his balance. The poison weakened him somewhat but couldn't keep him down for long. "I don't know what exactly it was that I did to make you hate me, but I'm sorry for whatever it was. Maddie doesn't need to know anything about this."

Vlad appreciated that. He really did because no matter what horrible things he did in his life, he didn't want Maddie to see him as a terrible person. "Jack," Vlad sighed as he walked over to the closet in the room to get the man's jumpsuit, "who wants you dead so badly?" Frowning, he turned to his old friend and held out the jumpsuit to him. "Who did you piss off?"

Jack shook his head then stopped, holding a hand to his head. "I have no idea." He shrugged as he took the jumpsuit. It was a small struggle to get the man back into it, and Vlad was forced to help him before he toppled over from loss of balance. After he was dressed, flimsy hospital gown tossed over the bed, Jack rested a hand upon his shoulder, and Vlad thought for a moment the man needed to catch his balance. "I'm really glad you're here." Jack squeezed his hand about Vlad's shoulder. "Even if it was for a bad reason, I'm glad we had this chance to hang out again. Made me think about our college days." A smile pulled across his face.

"Okay. Everything is filled out and the doctor said we're cleared to go," Phantom announced when he entered the room again.

"Excellent!" Jack said, back to his usual cheerful self. "Let's head to the car."

"Car?" Vlad repeated, and the other two turned their gazes onto him. "In case you missed it, I didn't exactly arrive at your house with a car in the first place." He folded his arms over his chest as he frowned at them. "How were you expecting me to bring a car?"

"You could have brought the Fenton Assault- Er, RV," Jack suggested.

"I'm thinking I'm lucky that I didn't take it." Vlad already saw the Fenton Assault Vehicle in action when he was trailing Jack previously to see if there was a time that he could kill Jack while Maddie wasn't present. He didn't like the looks of that thing, especially with all the added ghost hunting tech built into it.

"Then we'll call a cab," Phantom suggested. "Unless you want to walk back to Fenton Works while I fly Jack home." His green eyes pierced into Vlad, who realized at once what the ghost was doing. A test. Phantom wanted to see if when presented with another chance to make his escape, Vlad would take it. He gained the trust of the ghost, but Phantom needed to be certain his trust wasn't completely misplaced. After all, Vlad came here as a hit man.

"A cab should suffice." Vlad pulled out a cell phone to make the call to cab company and have them send a car to pick them up at the hospital.

Jack threw an arm around Vlad's shoulders as they left the hospital room with Phantom in the lead. "Have you been keeping up with the ghost research we did in college?" he asked, hugging Vlad close. Even though Vlad and Phantom watched Jack work on his inventions, the topic of the research they did back in college didn't come up in conversation, almost like it was taboo to bring it up until now.

Vlad shook his head. "Not since - No." He frowned, deciding to avoid mentioning the accident to Jack. He still felt bitterness over it, and maybe it was time to start letting some of that bitterness go. "I've been... busy... with my job." He didn't bother much with inventing weapons to combat ghosts when he had powers now to do the job. The only thing he continued work on since the accident was building his own working Portal into the Ghost Zone.

"Oh." Jack's smile faltered with the reminder of what Vlad's job was exactly. "That's a shame." They reached the lobby of the hospital and headed for the exit. Vlad cautiously glanced about for any sign of Pamela Manson, but the woman would be crazy to try attacking now with the number of witnessing in the lobby. Unless she tried to attack from the shadows, but there were too many people around that would risk an innocent person getting in the way. "Those were good times. I miss them," Jack continued as they stepped outside. "You, me, Maddie." He smiled fondly as he reminisced about their college days. "Good times."

Vlad nodded, feeling a pang in his chest. They were good times, and like Jack, he missed them too. Why did he spend so long away from his old friends? He was really beginning to forget the reason for his anger at Jack. The Portal blew up in his face, gave him ecto acne, and more importantly gave him ghost powers. He blamed Jack for the accident, cursed his name when he learned about Jack marrying Maddie, but they were happy together. He spent the past twenty-four years in self-induced misery, blaming everything wrong in his life on someone else.

They ended up having to wait ten minutes before the cab arrived. They piled in, Jack crammed into one side while Vlad was stuck between father and son. Silence filled the whole ride back to Fenton Works. Phantom remained tense and alert beside him. Placing a hand over one of the ghost's hands only helped a little in calming Phantom. Vlad vowed mentally that he would find his employer and stop them. Phantom didn't need to go through this, didn't need to suffer the constant worry of his father's life being at risk, especially when he died at such a young age.

The giant sign reading Fenton Works loomed in the distance as they neared the Fenton home. Vlad still thought it looked like an eyesore, and he decorated his castle with the Green Bay Packers paraphernalia, though he didn't get to enjoy that home much. The cab reached the house and parked right outside. When the driver asked for his money, both Jack and Danny turned their heads to the middle to where Vlad sat between them. With a grumble, Vlad pulled out his wallet and paid the man, who had gross greasy looking hands at which Vlad wrinkled his nose in disgust. Once they climbed out of the cab, they headed up to the front door. Jack unlocked the door, throwing it open wide for the other two men to enter his home first.

"Jack!" Maddie's voice still brought up those old feelings in Vlad of which he doubted he would ever completely rid himself. She rushed forward, ignoring Vlad and Phantom as she hugged her husband. It was a scene that pinched at Vlad's chest, but Maddie was happy. He thought, perhaps, he could give her up when he knew that the one she was with made her happy, even if it caused him some pain to see. "I was so worried when I came home and no one was here!" She wore a teal jumpsuit, and next to Jack, they looked like a perfect pair.

"How was your visit with Alicia?" Jack asked with a nervous laugh.

"It was fine." Maddie placed her hands on his hips as she glared up at her husband. "Though it turns out Alicia wasn't sick at all." Jack's gaze drifted toward Vlad, who glanced away and caught Phantom staring at him curiously. "And don't you dare try to change the topic," Maddie continued, pointing a finger in Jack's face to draw his attention back to her. "Where were you?" Despite the anger, worry clung to her voice, and if he could see her face, Vlad didn't doubt that tears would be gathering in her eyes as fears for the worst danced through her mind.

"It-" Jack sighed, hanging his head. "It was just a little incident. I ate something that was poisoned. But," he added quickly before his wife could start on an angry tirade, "thanks to Phantom's quick thinking, he got me to the hospital in time for them to administer an antidote and save me."

Maddie twisted around, her violet gaze landing on the ghost. Hesitation wrapped around her like a blanket before she stepped toward Phantom. "Thank you," she said, a hint of strain in her voice as a smile barely made it onto her face. It was difficult for her to thank a being that she spent so much of her life researching ways to eradicate from the real world. But she couldn't ignore that this ghost, this very strange ghost that she had no idea belonged to her son, saved her husband's life. She may not know or understand the reasons behind his actions, but she could be grateful that Phantom acted to keep her husband alive. Then she turned her gaze onto Vlad and smiled with much more ease. "Vlad! You should have told us you would be in town!" She stepped over to him and drew him into a hug. "We should have a big dinner tonight to celebrate this little reunion."

"That sounds wonderful," Vlad told her before he turned to give Jack a stern glare. "And no fudge for you."

"Aw!" Jack whined as he closed the door with a pout on his face.

"Unless Phantom helps me make some." Vlad glanced toward Phantom who blinked at the comment before it seemed to register in his head why Vlad would make that statement. Phantom nodded, a smile actually making it onto his face.


	11. Chapter 10

"Is that why you hate Dad?"

Phantom's voice drew Vlad's gaze toward the ghost. They were no longer bound together by the handcuffs, but they continued to share the ghost's old bedroom. Right now, Phantom sat on the desk, one knee drawn up to his chest and fingers laced over his knee as his green eyes stared piercingly at Vlad. His expression was unreadable in the still darkness with only a thin stream of moonlight coming in through a break in the curtains.

"You love Mom and that's why you hate Dad," Phantom elaborated when Vlad remained silently staring back at him as he lay on the bed with his arms folded behind his head. "And you made up that bogus story about Aunt Alicia being sick so that Mom would fly out to Spittoon to visit her so that she wouldn't be in the way when you tried to kill Dad."

"Part of it," Vlad answered, keeping the ghost's gaze as mild surprise entered his blue eyes. He was impressed that the ghost could pick up on that fact. "Yes, I knew if I made any attempt on Jack's life with Maddie around, she would try to stop me or put herself in harm's way to save Jack." Frowning, he turned his head, shifting his gaze to stare up at the ceiling as thoughts turned in his head. "Maybe it was just easier to blame him than realize the truth."

"What do you mean?" Phantom's head tilted with curiosity in his eyes.

Vlad sighed out tiredly as he closed his eyes. "I always cared for Maddie. To me, she was like the perfect woman. I wanted a life like this. A life with someone that loves me. Children, though that wouldn't have to be deal breaker. I could live without children if that's what she wanted." Opening his eyes again, he glanced toward Phantom. Children was clearly something Maddie wanted, and it pained him to know that she lost one of them when he was still so young. "But maybe I was only in love with the idea of that life with Maddie. Maybe if I had realized that years ago, I could be in a happy relationship with someone right now. Jack and I could have stayed friends this whole time. I could have known you as you grew up."

"You say that like you have no hope of finding someone," Phantom said, tilting his head as his mouth curved downward.

Vlad lifted an eyebrow at him. "You think anyone is going to love me after learning that I've killed probably hundreds of people at this point?" He shook his head, realizing he ruined his own chance at happiness by clinging to his bitterness over the accident.

"Maybe with the right person, they could at least look past that," Phantom offered. "You're changing. You're not that same person. At least," he glanced away, rubbing at the back of his neck, "I think you're changing. You want to protect Dad now. Or I think you do."

When Phantom glanced his way, Vlad held his gaze. "Yeah," he agreed, "I guess I do. Maybe," the corners of his mouth twitched as he restrained a smile, "I can forgive him someday soon."

"What did he do to you that was so bad? If it's not just about Mom." Phantom shifted uncomfortably on the desk, adjusting his posture like a nervous teenager. Vlad still couldn't get over the strangeness of the ghost. Phantom was far different from the ghosts he dealt with in the past. Vlad once again wondered how the ghost died, but it seemed impolite to pry when Phantom showed no desire to reveal that information to him.

"It's not important. It was a long time ago." It felt like a lifetime ago to him now. Vlad could almost forget that it ever happened, that accident that changed his life. The bed creaked and the mattress dipped, and Vlad turned his head to Phantom, who had moved to join him on the bed. He lifted a curious eyebrow at the uncertainty wavering in the ghost's expression.

Phantom held out a hand before him that glowed softly with a green light, and Vlad still couldn't sense him as a ghost. His gaze slid toward Vlad and half a smile pulled at his mouth. Sparks shot from his hand, and Vlad followed the streams streaking through the air and watched as they exploded like little fireworks, leaving a splattering of green specks glowing upon the ceiling. It reminded him of an eerie night sky.

"What is this?" Vlad asked, marveling the display. He never saw another ghost utilize their powers in this manner, making him wonder all the more about the oddity that was Phantom.

"You see those three dots right there?" Phantom questioned as he pointed them out, an arm stretching over his head as his finger trailed along the line of three dots that shone just a touch brighter than those around them. "That's Orion's Belt. And," he twisted his hand, making the lights rearrange themselves, "that's the Big Dipper."

"Stars," Vlad mumbled, now understanding what the ghost was showing him. Constellations, to be more exact.

"Yeah." Phantom ducked his head, his cheeks turning green, but Vlad wasn't sure if that was from the glow of the starry display overhead or not. "I always had this dream of being an astronaut." His smile fell as his eyes darkened. "I probably studied more about the stars and space than I did for school." He laughed, a breathy noise that almost held a hint of a sob. "Maybe if I had worked harder on my school studies instead, I would have gotten better grades. Not that it really matters anymore."

Vlad sat up and placed a hand on the ghost's shoulder. What could he even say? He couldn't encourage Phantom and tell if he worked hard, he might be able to achieve his goal. The misery on Phantom's face grabbed at Vlad's chest and squeezed until he thought he couldn't breathe anymore. Phantom had dreams and aspirations when he was alive. He had so much to live for but it was all snatched away from in by some cruel twist of fate. Vlad could relate to that, somewhat, when he thought of the accident that gave him his ghost powers as a life ruining event.

He squeezed his hand around the shoulder, trying to offer some measure of comfort to the young ghost. "It's okay not to bring up memories of your life."

Phantom glanced his way, a strange look in his green eyes. "You mentioned wanting to know me as I grew up." He shrugged, though his sorrow remained draped over him. "I thought I could at least tell you a few things about me. Or who I was when I was alive."

Oh. Vlad tried not to openly wince as he felt a pinch in his chest. He didn't want Phantom stirring up memories that would make him sad because of a comment he made. His hand remained on the ghost's shoulder as he pondered some way to steer the conversation away from this depressing talk.

"We should start trying to figure out the identity of the person hiring hit men to target Jack," Vlad suggested in a pathetically obvious change of topics.

Phantom almost showed a hint of gratefulness before his expression turned serious. "You have no idea who hired you?"

Vlad shook his head. "Clients give me the information on the target anonymously and usually pay in cash so there's no paper trail connecting them. It's supposed to ensure that I can't rat them out if I get captured." He frowned grimly. "Though now I'm regretting that policy."

"It's smart," Phantom said dryly with a glower. "I hate you for it." He sighed, running a hand through his white hair. "So no help there." His mouth pursed, and his fingers tapped over the mattress as he thought. "Maybe Sam's mom isn't as clever. If we can catch her, maybe we can pry some answers out of her."

"If she's good," and Vlad suspected that she was if she lasted this long without being captured, "she'll know as little about her client as possible. She'll also be well versed in staying silent under torture. We could hold her for weeks and still never get any answers. And by then, we might have another hit man to deal with."

Phantom released a frustrated growl as he climbed to his feet and paced the length of the bedroom. Vlad watched, one foot then the next. It wouldn't be odd, if Phantom was human. Why didn't he float around like most other ghosts? In fact, everything that Phantom did was almost distinctly human. Perhaps it was merely because he was still a young ghost and he hadn't fully immersed himself into his afterlife as a ghost. Maybe it helped him cling to what humanity remained in him, unlike other ghosts that abandoned themselves to their obsessions. Vlad leaned his chin in his hand as he observed the ghost.

"What we need to do is figure out why anyone would want to kill Dad," Phantom said, his thumb at his mouth as he chewed on the nail. If he wasn't careful, he was going to chew the entire nail right off his thumb. "You hated him." He paused to stare at Vlad.

"Yes, but even though I fantasized about killing him, I never went through with any of those ideas," Vlad answered then frowned as it occurred to him that he was discussing this with Jack's son. Hearing about someone actually planning, even just in his head, about killing his father had to bother Phantom, even if he didn't show it. "I was bitter and angry, but that's no real excuse for the thoughts that went through my head."

"And Sam's mom pretty much hates everything about Dad." Phantom winced then sighed, his shoulders slumping. "This isn't helping. There could be a million reasons for someone to put a hit on Dad." He stepped in front of Vlad and grabbed hold of the man's shoulders, giving him a sharp shake. "What am I supposed to do, Vlad? I have to protect Dad. But how can I do that if I can't even figure out why someone wants to kill him?"

All day around Jack and Maddie, Phantom was the silent bodyguard, his expression neutral but his eyes alert as he watched for any sign that an attack might come. He didn't join them for dinner, like he did when it was only the three of them, and Vlad didn't force him to sit down at the table and eat with them. A ghost didn't need human sustenance, after all. He was strong in front of Jack and Maddie. He had to be so that they wouldn't doubt his capabilities as a bodyguard. But here, alone with it just them, Phantom allowed himself to breakdown and show his real anxieties to the only person that knew the truth about him. Phantom leaned on him, Vlad realized with a jolt of surprise. He was the only one that could hope to understand even a small amount of what the ghost was going through, and Phantom needed that, no matter how tiny Vlad's understanding of his situation was.

"We'll figure this out," Vlad said firmly, holding Phantom's gaze. "No one is going to get another chance to hurt Jack. We're going to stop them. You need to stay calm. We might not have answers right now, but we'll work out the truth if we just get the clues to put all the pieces together. But you're going to start overlooking things if you start panicking and breaking down."

"I know." Phantom nodded as he moved to sit down next to Vlad on the bed. "I know. It's just so much sometimes." He leaned forward, burying his face in his hands. "Sometimes I worry that I can't do this."

Vlad hesitated. He wasn't good with this whole supporting someone thing anymore. Since the accident, he didn't get close to people. His arm wrapped around the ghost, drawing him closer as Phantom leaned his weight against him. "You can do this," he assured the ghost. "And you don't have to do it alone."

"You'll help?"

"I'll help."


	12. Chapter 11

There was a weight next to him when he woke up, his dark blue eyes sliding sideways toward the body curled up beside him. Phantom looked smaller somehow with soft lashes brushing over pale cheeks and that odd slow rise and fall of his chest. Ghosts imitated the human form, a memory leftover from when they were alive, though some didn't even retain that memory, winding up as shapeless blobs. Their insides, however, didn't reflect the same complexity of a living human. Ghosts didn't have lungs or the need to the breathe. Why did Phantom breathe? It was a question that barely registered in his mind at the hospital when he was trying to get the ghost to calm down and explain things to him. Was it simply a recalled memory from his life, thinking he still needed to breathe even though he was dead?

Whatever the answer, Vlad decided it best not to mess with the ghost's logic. Disrupting a ghost's belief could be very dangerous if they were to react negatively to the truth. It was like when a ghost didn't realize it was dead until someone pointed it out to them, and then the ghost responded violently to the news. Vlad had see it happen once or twice before, newly formed ghosts that didn't have any recollection of their deaths or understood how to control their powers. Those types were dangerous.

Vlad shifted on the bed, trying to quietly climb off it without alerting the ghost. But the moment he moved, Phantom sat up, head snapping around in search of an assassin sneaking into the house to kill his father. In less than a second, the relaxed posture turned tense, muscles growing taut with the thought of an oncoming battle. Then his green eyes found Vlad, and the air seemed to deflate from him as his shoulders slumped forward.

"I wasn't sleeping," Phantom stated firmly, glaring at the man like Vlad accused him doing just that. Ghosts didn't often sleep, not in the same sense, but there were occasions after expelling too much energy when they needed rest to recover what was lost, or they consumed ectoplasm to regain their energies. The little starry light show that Phantom put on last night wouldn't have used up much of his energy at all, but on an emotional level, Phantom was running on fumes and need the rest before he broke completely from the stress.

"I said nothing." Vlad stood, controlling the smirk that tried to stretch across his face. As tempting as it was to make a teasing remark, he held back on it, deciding that Phantom didn't need to feel like a failure for falling asleep on the job on top of everything else he was feeling. They left the bedroom and headed down the stairs toward the kitchen where Phantom's parents were already preparing breakfast.

"It was nice to visit Alicia," Maddie said as she served up a nice stack of pancakes, not burnt this time, onto Jack's plate. "I don't really get to see her that often, so even after I realized that the whole message about Alicia having breast cancer was false, I decided to stay a bit longer there. It was nice catching up with her again, even if she does-" Maddie winced as she glanced at her husband.

"Hate me?" Jack completed what Maddie wouldn't finish, but he didn't look bothered by the fact that his wife's sister didn't particularly like him.

"Aunt Alicia always thought Dad was an idiot," Phantom whispered, sticking close to Vlad so that his parents wouldn't overhear the comment. "She thought Mom could have done a lot better, but well, when it's love, things like a rich husband doesn't always matter."

Vlad turned and lifted an eyebrow at the ghost, and Phantom blinked then his eyes widened as he raised his hands and waved them before him, trying to work up a protest.

"Good morning, Vlad!" Maddie greeted when she spotted the pair still in the doorway of the kitchen.

"So you had a pleasant visit with your sister?" Vlad strode over to the table and took a seat as Maddie made up plates for herself and him. "That's good to hear."

Maddie nodded as she sat down next to her husband. "But it's good to be back home. I don't mind roughing it, but I must say it as nice to have a working bathroom and to sleep in my own bed again. I had a terrible time falling asleep while I was there."

"I didn't sleep all that well with you gone," Jack admitted, and at the look they shared with that unquestionable love in their eyes, Vlad felt jealousy rising up in him. This time, however, he recognized it not as being jealous that Jack stole Maddie from him but that they shared a love that he had yet to experience himself.

Vlad tossed a glance over his shoulder as he ate his breakfast. Phantom remained at the doorway, leaning against the frame as he stared toward the front hall. If he had only realized the truth of his own feelings sooner, this scenario could be vastly different. He wouldn't have come here as a hit man. Perhaps Phantom would have still been alive, and they could enjoy this family breakfast together. Maybe he could have offered Phantom help with his studies. What if scenarios played out in his mind, but he shook them away because they would only leave him with depression weighing down on him as he stared at the reality around him.

"No special someone in your life?" Maddie questioned as they spent the early afternoon in the laboratory. She shoved a part into his hands and dragged him over to participate in helping them build an ecto-skeleton battle suit that was supposed to maximize their power in fighting ghosts. It was still in an experimental stage and not ready for testing.

Vlad shook his head as he glanced at the schematics for the ecto-skeleton. "I guess I never met the right person." His gaze darted toward Phantom, who sat on a table across the room as he watched them. "Maybe one day though."

"Well, whenever you meet that right person, you have to introduce us." Maddie smiled sweetly.

"Yeah," Jack said and slapped Vlad on the back. "We gotta make sure whoever it is, is perfect for you."

Vlad smiled somewhat in return. In a moment like this, he could almost imagine that the three of them were back in college, working on their projects like always. His gaze drifted around the laboratory, noting all the various inventions, some completed while others remained in pieces still, laying all around the room. Then his eyes halted on the yellow and black striped door set into the far wall. He noticed it before when they spent the day in the laboratory, and it didn't surprise him that Jack and Maddie continued to work on the Portal after college. They worked long and hard on the Proto Portal before the accident, and they would feel unsatisfied if they didn't complete the work on it. Vlad understood the feeling, though the reason that drove him into completing the Portal was so that he would have access to the Ghost Zone whenever he liked.

"I think the plans could use a little adjustment," Vlad said, not with that condescending hint in his voice that he might have used over a week ago while thinking Jack a complete moron.

"What do you mean?" Jack asked, almost pouting that his work was being called into question.

"Well, it seems to me that by these plans, the ecto-skeleton will drain the user," Vlad explained with a frown. "If used for too long, the user could end up dead."

"We did have a bit of concern regarding that," Maddie admitted as she joined Vlad at the table to look over the blueprints. "What do you suggest?"

"You need a renewable power source that won't drain the user." Vlad tapped a finger on the work table, trying to think of a way to make it work.

"Oh!" Jack hurried off to another part of the laboratory, and Vlad and Maddie watched him dig through some other inventions. Then Jack crossed back over to them with a device in his hands. "The Ecto Converter!" He grinned proudly as he held it out to show the other two. "Though we never got it working."

"That could indeed work," Vlad agreed with a hand to his chin as he gave it some thought. If it could take a sample of ectoplasm and convert it into renewable energy, that would eliminate the drain on the wearer of the ecto-skeleton.

"We just never had a good sample from a ghost to test it," Maddie admitted as her mouth curved downward. Violet eyes drifted to the other side of the room where Phantom sat. "We could," she started hesitantly. "Well, only if you agree to it."

Vlad caught that uncertain, apprehension in Phantom's eyes. "Is it going to hurt him?"

"Vlad, you know ghosts don't-" Jack snapped his mouth shut when Vlad glared at him with zero humor in his eyes. Vlad didn't like that attitude, that thought that ghosts were unfeeling entities. He came to know some ghosts in his time as a half ghost and discovered that they, much like himself, were quite capable of feeling pain. He didn't like that uncaring attitude toward ghosts, but Jack and Maddie didn't have the same experiences with ghosts that he did. "Well, _if_ ghost can feel pain, it might hurt a little. But we wouldn't need a very big sample from him. It'll probably feel like nothing more than a bit of a pinch."

"I'll do it," Phantom announced without even a hint of a waver in his voice. "How does this work?"

"You should just have to touch it," Jack explained as he crossed over to where Phantom sat. How could they not see that this was their son? But perhaps it was easier on them not to see, not to recognize their son in a being that they fought against to keep the real world safe. If they saw Phantom as their son, they would have to suffer the pain of realizing it was their son that they fought. Sometimes, being oblivious was better than the truth. "It should pull in a sample of your ectoplasm just from that."

Phantom gulped visibly, and Vlad wondered if Jack or Maddie ever noticed those distinctly human responses, or if they kept themselves blinded to how strange Phantom was as a ghost. He placed his hand onto the Ecto Convert, his face immediately contorting in a wince of pain. A green glow spread from his hand to the Converter, and after a moment, he yanked his hand back with a hiss. The Converter continued to glow for several moments afterward as Phantom shook out his hand. It didn't look like it caused any harm to the ghost, and Vlad breathed out in relief that beyond a small bit of pain, Phantom didn't suffer any lasting damage.

"Now we'll be able to test it out and see if it works," Jack said excitedly, like a kid that got a new toy for Christmas and couldn't wait to play with it.

"We first need to figure out how to add it to the ecto-skeleton," Maddie reminded him as the doorbell ringing echoed through the house. With a sigh, she put down the blueprints that she was examining. "Who could that be?" After he set down the Ecto Converter on a work table, Jack followed his wife out of the laboratory.

"How's the hand?" Vlad questioned as he walked with Phantom up the stairs.

"Stings a bit." Phantom frowned, staring down at his hand as he curled and uncurled his fingers. There was no visible sign of injury, luckily. "But I've experienced worse fighting."

Vlad didn't doubt that if Phantom acted as protector to Amity Park, but it still brought a frown to his face. They remained in the kitchen, much like the last time someone came to the house, but they were alert, ready to spring into action should an attack come. Phantom's eyes narrowed as he stared into the hall, watching his parents as they opened the front door.

"Why hello!" the woman at the door greeted, and her voice sounded painfully false with that sugary cheer in it. Vlad was fairly certain he could already guess who it was. He didn't hear her speak while they were at the hospital, but the voice matched what he imagined to be Pamela Manson's voice. "I brought apple pie."

The door had closed after they allowed the woman to enter their house. Beside Vlad, Phantom tensed up, his hand gripping the doorframe until the knuckles turned white. They knew that she would try again to assassinate Jack, it was merely a matter of time, and it seemed that poison was her choice of killing methods. It wasn't even a question in his mind. Vlad knew the pie would be poisoned. Pamela Manson would likely use a much faster acting poison, something that would ensure Jack would die before they could get him to the hospital or figure out an antidote. Maybe she even hoped all of them would sample the pie so that none of them would be left to try to save Jack.

Maddie's hand lashed out, knocking the pie from the woman's hands. The pie made a splat as it hit the wall in the front hall then the tin clanged upon the floor when it fell. Jack groaned in disappointment to see the pie destroyed in one swift movement. Pamela, whose face he could see between Maddie and Jack, gawked at her in shock of Maddie's action.

"So much for letting her continue to think we aren't on to her," Vlad mumbled to the ghost beside him.

"I wouldn't be too sure of that," Phantom whispered back.

"What are you really doing here?" Maddie demanded with anger in her voice as she placed her hands on her hips.

"I happen to work at the hospital," Pamela answered, mustering up the snobby tone of a woman of class as she smoothed down her pink dress with white gloved hands. "I heard that your husband was brought in the other night, so I thought I would bring over an apple pie as a sort of get well gesture."

"Jack hates apple pie," Maddie said firmly.

"But I like-" Jack started to argue but swallowed his words when Maddie snapped her head around to him. "Right. Apple pie. Hate it." Jack pulled a disgusted face.

"Well, I'm not surprised that your son had such bad manners." Pamela huffed, tilting her head up and giving that sniff of disdain. "With parents like you, it's not surprising that he ended up dead at so young an age. At least it saved him the humiliation of having freaks for parents." If she was looking for a reaction out of Maddie, Pamela got it.

Maddie drew back her fist then drove it forward at the woman's face. Vlad was aware of Maddie's fighting ability as she was already a ninth degree black belt when he knew her in college. Sometimes, as a break when they were all studying, she would run through some moves, saying it helped clear her mind when it got too full of everything she was trying to remember for exams. Vlad always thought she looked like she was performing a beautiful dance as he watched her graceful yet strong and powerful movements flow from one strike to the next. He briefly wondered if Maddie trained Phantom while he was alive. It would explain his great capability in a fight.

Pamela, however, was ready for the attack. She ducked under Maddie's arm and swept her foot around to unbalance Maddie. She failed as Maddie slammed a foot into her chest. With a gasp, she stumbled back until she hit the closed door. Aqua colored eyes narrowed, anger twisting upon the woman's face. She charged forward at Maddie, but a flash of silver flew from her hand as she went in for the tackle.

His movements felt sluggish, the world seeming to slow in that moment as he raced forward to help. Vlad caught movement beside him, and Phantom darted past him, flying at great sped toward his father. Pamela tried to force her opponent to the ground, but Maddie grabbed her by the arm and threw her over her shoulder. Pamela slammed her back into the ground with a rush of air forced from her lungs. But Vlad's gaze was on Phantom and Jack. He heard the knife bury itself into Phantom's chest with a sickening thud before the ghost hit the ground. Green ectoplasm oozed thickly from the point of injury, and Phantom gritted his teeth to keep from screaming out. Jack dropped to his knees as Vlad reached them. No matter what he believed about ghosts not feeling pain, in that moment, he threw out that thinking when Phantom saved him from a knife being buried deep in his own chest.

"We've got medical supplies in the lab," Jack stated, his voice louder than necessary in his panic. He lifted the ghost into his arms, wrenching a strangled growling from Phantom as the movement jerked the knife in his chest. Stupid questions raced through Vlad's mind. Why didn't Phantom just turn Jack intangible to save them both from the knife? Why didn't he just throw up a shield around Jack? But how could he expect Phantom to think rationally when his own mind was racing with panic?

"So what exactly is going on?" Maddie questioned, eying Vlad as she held Pamela pinned to the ground under her weight. Jack, meanwhile, rushed off to the laboratory to tend to Phantom's injury. "Why exactly did this witch of a woman just try to kill my husband?" She frowned severely in that way Vlad remembered well when she wanted answers and wouldn't let him escape without getting them.

At that moment, Vlad really wanted to follow Jack and make sure that Phantom was okay, but he sighed as he crouched down beside Maddie. "It turns out she was hired to kill him. She's the one that poisoned the fudge." He frowned down at Pamela, who was snarling like a trapped beast. His dark blue eyes narrowed dangerously. "Who hired you?"

"I'd sooner bite down on a cyanide pill than tell you," Pamela shouted as she struggled, thrashing uselessly beneath Maddie.

"That," Maddie said with a coldness in her voice that chilled Vlad and made him shudder, "can be arranged." She grabbed hold of Pamela's auburn hair, messing up the perfectly styled locks, and tilted her head back so that their eyes met. Violet glared icily into aqua. "But I suppose I'll just have to settle for detaining you until this little mess is cleared up. I'll _try_ to remember that you need to be fed."

Yes, Vlad was _definitely_ grateful that Jack would be keeping the secret of Vlad's own role as a hit man. He didn't want to have Maddie's wrath turned on him.


	13. Chapter 12

"I can't say I ever liked the woman," Maddie said, arms folded as she frowned at the auburn haired woman on the within the cage. It was set up as a means of containing ghosts, but it did well enough as a holding cell for a human too. Pamela stood, fuming with her arms crossed and her reddened face contorted with rage. Her hair was a tangled mess, but in her fury, she didn't bother to smooth it out into some semblance of neatness. "But I never imagined that she would be a killer." Maddie shook her head with a look of disappointment on her face. "I feel sorry for Sam. If she ever knew about this secret life, I think she'd be very upset."

"At least she wouldn't have to suffer the humiliation of having incompetent idiots for parents." Pamela smirked smugly, and the rage that flashed in Maddie's violet eyes showed him that the barb struck its target.

Vlad moved at once, catching Maddie about the waist before she could charge toward the cage with its solid, clear walls. "She's just looking to provoke a reaction out of you," he whispered to Maddie. "If you get mad, you might slip up and it will allow her the chance to escape. Stay calm."

"Easy for you to say," Maddie grumbled, tearing herself free of his hold. "She isn't insulting _your_ parenting methods."

Vlad walked over to the control panel of the cage and pressed a button that cut off the intercom. Now Pamela wouldn't be able to hear them speak, and they wouldn't be able to hear her. She could throw all the insults she wanted without getting under Maddie's skin. Vlad narrowed his dark blue eyes at the woman beyond the thick wall. He wanted to give her a few good punches of his own for suggesting that Maddie wasn't a good mother. Before they forced Pamela into the cage, they searched her for any weapons or tools that she might use to try to escape. Most of them wouldn't help in a cell meant for ghosts. But she carried a gun, several hidden knives, a few types of poison, and a set of lock picks at easy to reach locations. She came over prepared for a fight. A smirk snuck onto his face. Pamela didn't realize what an expert fighter Maddie was.

"We can't leave her locked up in there forever," Phantom said, drawing their attention to him as he sat up on the work table. Jack cleared one of them of all the materials on it, which now lay in a mess around the table, when he brought the ghost down to the laboratory then immediately proceeded to tend to the ghost's injury. Vlad was impressed with his work. He never realized that Jack knew how to stitch up an injury like that, but Jack _was_ always good with a needle.

"A doctor could have done it better," Jack stated with a frown as he stared at his work, tiny bright green stitching holding the wound in Phantom's chest sealed tightly. He patted the ghost clean with a towel to wipe away all the sticky ectoplasm that escaped from his injury. Vlad frowned as he stared at the ghost, the pale chest with faint green lines stretched over his flesh in branches, reminding him of the pattern of lightning. But as quickly as he could, Phantom zipped up a vest to cover the sight from the adults, but it left Vlad wondering again about the ghost's death.

"We won't keep her in there forever," Maddie said, though she looked highly tempted to do just that after the insults Pamela spat out. "But we can't allow her to go free while the hit still stands on Jack." She glanced toward her husband, fear and worry shining in her violet eyes. That look only served to remind Vlad, with a defeated feeling, that even if he had tried, he never would have won her heart against Jack.

"And for that we first need to figure out who put the hit out," Vlad said, raking a hand through his hair, trying to smooth down the silvery locks as his mind turned over what little facts there were. They had nothing to go on, and even if Pamela knew anything about her employer, she wouldn't tell them anything. He strode over to the work table and stood before Phantom. "How are you feeling?"

Phantom blinked up at him, surprise in his green eyes. "A little thing like this won't stop me from doing my job." He put on a smile, but there was some force to it. Vlad never personally experienced being stabbed in the chest, but he knew it would hurt. But Phantom needed to put on the brave act, needing his parents to think he was still able to be a bodyguard but more importantly proving to himself that he could do it to erase any thought of being a failure. Vlad's hand curled at his side, resisting that temptation to reach out and place it on the ghost's shoulder, give him a comforting squeeze that told Phantom everything would be all right.

"Vlad, help me with dinner," Maddie requested as she took hold of his wrist and pulled him toward the stairs to the kitchen. His brow wrinkled, confusion in his eyes because it was still quite some time before dinner.

"What is it?" Vlad questioned when Maddie shut the door to the laboratory. He lifted an eyebrow at her as he followed her toward the refrigerator where she pulled out the thawed chicken.

"You seem quite," she glanced toward Vlad, her mouth pursing as she searched for the word, "chummy with Phantom." She gave him a curious look as she flipped on the television on the counter. An ad was playing with some catchy little ditty as they promoted pet owners to buy their brand of cat food.

"He's not the enemy," Vlad pointed out as he opened the draw where the Fentons kept the spices. "He wants to keep this world safe from the bad ghosts just as much as you do."

"Bad ghosts?" Maddie repeated as they picked out what spices to use on the chicken. A thoughtful frown settled onto her face as her brow creased. Vlad could almost envision the gears turning in her head as she powered through her thoughts. "I suppose you make a good point there." The look she wore suggested that she was trying to recover from having some her belief shaken. "Phantom has only really acted to protect. But that's strange for a ghost. Ghosts are supposed to follow their obsessions. They aren't supposed to care about protecting others, especially not the living."

"I don't think much can be described as normal where Phantom is concerned." When Maddie gave him a confused look, Vlad shook his head. He was thinking out loud with that comment. "Perhaps part of his obsession is protecting people. Not all ghosts are out to torment the living. Some," he frowned as he thought about some of the ghosts that he met in the Ghost Zone, "just want to be left alone."

"Why haven't you come to visit us until now?" It was a sudden change, but Vlad suspected it was what Maddie truly wished to ask him.

Vlad frowned as he tapped out some of the spices onto the chicken pieces in the pan. "I was mad with Jack."

"Mad enough to want to kill him?"

Vlad nearly dropped the container of spices, but after a fumble, he managed to catch it. His head snapped around toward Maddie as his mouth hung open in a look of shock. Then he slowly closed his mouth as it drew into a frown. Maddie was still as perceptive as ever, he realized. "When I came, yes." His voice was tight, and he took a breath before speaking again. "But I never got the chance to go through with any thoughts running through my head. Thanks to your ghostly protection." He smirked a little. "Then I realized that my anger was misplaced. I won't be trying to kill your husband any time soon."

"Good." Maddie lifted her chin into the air. "Because I can just as easily put you in that spectral containment unit with the witch." Her gaze slid toward Vlad, and half a smirk ghosted onto her face. "Is that why you got so friendly with Phantom? Because he helped you let go of that anger?" She seemed genuinely curious about it.

"You know," Vlad almost sighed, feeling exhaustion tug at him, "ghosts aren't completely mindless. They're still capable of conscious thought and the same level of reasoning as a living human."

"You seem to have picked up a lot about ghosts for someone that apparently gave up researching them." Maddie gave him a pointed stare, like she suspected he lied about that fact.

"There's a lot you can learn when you're chained to a ghost for over a week." Vlad smirked slyly back at her as they finished prepping the chicken to put in the oven.

"Oh! They're playing that commercial again!" Jack said when he entered the kitchen.

Vlad had completely forgotten that the television was even on as he talked with Maddie. His gaze drifted over to the little television and watched as two men in white suits started speaking. The television suddenly switched off, screen blinking to black, before Vlad could get any understanding of what they were advertising. He thought maybe it was for some sort of cleaning product as he was certain one of them was holding up a lint roller.

"What was that about?" Vlad questioned, turning around to face his old friends. Maddie still held the remote in her hand with a sour expression upon her face. Jack looked excited by the commercial until Maddie elbowed him, and his smile fell into a frown. At the doorway to the laboratory, Phantom scowled, arms folded over his chest. The vest he wore was stained with his bright green ectoplasm.

"Oh, just the world's leading experts on ghosts," Maddie said, sarcasm dripping from her voice like venom as she seethed at the claim.

"You haven't heard of them before?" Jack gawked, like he could hardly believe it. "They're only the biggest name around in the ghost hunting community. They have headquarters all over the world." He spread his arms wide to emphasize his meaning.

"I can't say I have." With a frown, Vlad found it hard to believe that anyone could have better technology where ghost hunting was concerned than his college friends. Jack and Maddie had an actual ghost in the home that willingly allowed them to test their inventions on him. Vlad still felt a little unsettled by that fact with the memory that Phantom was their son prodding at his mind like sharp poker.

He really was out of touch with the ghost hunting world. Vlad hadn't paid much attention to the latest technology in ghost hunting as he delved deeper into his life as a hit man. He still recalled a thing or two when it came to working with ecto based technology, but most of his mind became dedicated to thinking of ways to kill the target for his assignment. He never heard word of a worldwide grouping of ghost hunters, and he never imagined that any ghost hunter would have commercials promoting themselves.

"They have this really cool thing called the Ecto Exterminator 5000," Jack said in that excited as a kid in a candy store voice with giddiness in his dark blue eyes. "I've been dying to get my hands on one of them and take it apart."

_Of course he would_ , Vlad thought with a tug of a smile at his mouth. He could remember Jack staying up late into the night taking things apart to find out how it worked. Then he would come up with a hundred different ways for how he thought he could make it better than the original. Despite how wacky and bizarre some of his ideas were, Jack could come up with some pretty creative designs. They didn't always work, but a surprising amount of them did, eventually with some tinkering.

"They're all a bunch of idiots," Maddie stated firmly as she shoved the pan of chicken into the oven then slammed the door shut with a bang that made all three men jump. An angry Maddie was definitely to be avoided if possible.


	14. Chapter 13

"You're a strange person."

Vlad turned his head when he heard Phantom speak. They sat in the front room while Jack and Maddie returned to the laboratory to tinker with a few things after dinner was eaten. Vlad volunteered to wash the dishes, and when he finished, he decided to sit in the front room and ponder over thoughts of whom would want Jack dead and for what reason. Phantom had joined him silently, no doubt alert and listening for any sounds of a hit man trying to sneak into the house or trouble occurring in the laboratory. However, with Maddie home again, Vlad felt like some of the weight lifted from his shoulders as Maddie was a fierce fighter that would stand against anyone that tried to get close enough to harm her husband.

Knowing how protective she could be about those she cared for, Vlad worried that she might show hatred toward him after he confessed his original intentions for coming to Amity Park. He should have known that Maddie would pick up on it, even if neither he nor Jack said anything. Maddie was always perceptive when it came to the two of them, and she could always tell when they were keeping secrets from her. He should have seen it coming that Maddie would ask about it, but it still caught him by surprise. Perhaps it was his honesty when questioned about it and the show that he was letting go of his anger that allowed Maddie not to become mad at him. Maybe she, like Jack, was just so happy to have him back in her life that she could find forgiveness toward him.

"You're one to talk," Vlad said, reaching over to drop his hand on the ghost's head and ruffle the snowy white locks.

Phantom lowered himself on the couch, his knees pressing against his chest in a way that gave him the impression of a small child. His hands went to his head, like he was protecting it, as his cheeks colored a soft shade of green. Vlad blinked, lifting a curious eyebrow in response to the ghost's reaction.

"Sorry," Phantom mumbled as his fingers threaded through his hair. "Dad used to do that sometimes." He frowned and kept his gaze lowered, sadness drifting into his green eyes.

Vlad retracted his hand, dropping it to his side. Of course the ghost would be sensitive to things that reminded him too much of his life. "So why do you say I'm strange?"

Phantom hunched up his shoulders and tilted his head to the side as he scratched at his temple. "Just the way you act around me." He glanced up at Vlad then back down quickly. "Around you, I don't feel like some ecto freak of nature. You treat me like an actual person. I mean, I guess Mom and Dad have been a bit better since they stopped blasting at me and allowed me to be a bodyguard." His mouth curved downward as he held a hand over his chest, grabbing at the stained fabric of his vest. "For the most part, I'm still seen as that thing to experiment on, see what best works when fighting against a ghost, and stuff. I'm kind of surprised Dad reacted like that. You know, stitching me up. It probably would have healed on its own. Eventually. Or I could have done it myself."

Vlad wondered what went through Jack mind in that moment, in that rush of panic spurring him into action to help the ghost. Did Jack maybe have a flash of seeing his son in Phantom? Did he have that rush of thinking that saving Phantom maybe would help to alleviate any sense of guilt when it came to not being able to save his son? Vlad couldn't know what Jack thought when he decided to stitch up Phantom's injury, and he didn't think it was appropriate to question his friend about it. He had seen Jack hurting over the loss of his son, and he didn't want to make those memories resurface yet again in the man.

"Perhaps it helps that you still act so human," Vlad said, and while that might be in part true, the fact that Vlad was half ghost and had come to learn far more about ghosts also allowed him to treat Phantom differently than his own parents.

"What?" Phantom blinked owlishly at Vlad, confirming what he thought in his mind about the ghost not even realizing his own actions.

"That." Vlad pointed at the ghost. "You're sitting like a normal person would."

Phantom blinked then dropped his gaze and really looked at him. "Oh," he said, sounding surprised by that simple fact. "So I should be more like this?" He pushed off from the couch and floated in the air, drifting lazily until he put his feet under him and touched down on the floor beyond the coffee table.

"You shouldn't-" Vlad paused, his mouth drawing thin as he tilted his head in thought. "I guess you can say it's like living. There's no manual for it, and it's all up to you to make your own choices. Good or bad, it's really up to you how to act." He leaned forward, observing Phantom who placed his hands on his hips and tilted his head as the man spoke. "You shouldn't force yourself to act like how people expect a ghost to behave. Just do what feels natural to you."

"Even if it makes me odd?" Phantom lifted his eyebrows, but a smirk tugged at his mouth and a laugh shone in his eyes.

Vlad snorted but grinned. "Being normal is overrated anyway." He glanced toward the doorway to the kitchen. If he listened closely, he could make out some noise from the laboratory as Maddie and Jack tinkered with their inventions. "Do you think your parents ever worried about being normal or if other people thought they were weird?"

Phantom chuckled and shook his head. "No, I suppose they don't." He smiled as he walked forward, phasing through the table, then he dropped onto the couch again. "They just follow their passion."

"We got one!" Jack shouted, and they could hear footsteps racing up the stairs and into the kitchen.

"Speaking of their passion," Phantom said with a sigh as he braced his hands on the edge of the couch cushion then pushed himself up to stand again.

Vlad lifted his brows, leaning back against the couch as the pair entered the front room. "What's happening?" From the excitement in their gazes, he was fairly certainly he already knew the answer to that question. Only one thing could make Jack and Maddie that excited: ghosts.

"Our scanner detected spectral activity within the town's limits," Maddie answered, adjusting the bazooka strapped to her back.

"Come on, Vlad!" Jack held out a weapon toward him. "It'll be just like the old days." He smiled encouragingly, giving the weapon a small wiggle of enticement.

Vlad sighed, pretending it was a chore to climb off the couch. "I suppose I could go with you," he said as he took hold of the weapon. He would have gone regardless of whether he was asked to go or not. Maddie would do anything to keep Jack safe, and Phantom was desperately doing his best to protect his father. An extra pair of eyes to watch for anyone making an attempt on Jack's life would help them both, and Vlad promised Phantom he would do his best to help keep Jack safe. And he truly wanted to, as Jack slowly became a friend to him again in his mind. He regretted the past years of hating the man, who was such a close friend to him during his college days.

"Great!" Jack landed a large hand upon Vlad's shoulder with that usual warm smile upon his face. Sometimes, Vlad was glad for Jack's naivety that allowed him to be such a forgiving man.

Maddie was already out the door, and Vlad heard the revving of a loud engine. A sense of dread came over him as he realized that going with his friends meant risking that probable death trap of a contraption that they called the Fenton Family Assault Vehicle. He saw them crashing through town in it previously and had little desire to try riding in it.

"It won't be so bad," Phantom assured him with a laugh as he patted Vlad on the shoulder after noting his ashen face at the thought of the Assault Vehicle.

"Easy for you to say," Vlad grumbled dryly as he shot a look at the ghost that walked beside him toward the vehicle. Phantom folded his arms behind his head with a cheeky smile upon his face. It looked natural and comfortable, and Vlad was glad to see such an expression on his face. "You could easily fly around instead of riding in that death trap."

Phantom tilted his head as his eyes ran over the vehicle. "I think you're pretty safe from death in it. I think it's the people on the street that really have to worry."

Vlad laughed, and it felt good, as he climbed into the Assault Vehicle. Once he was seated, he securely did his seatbelt. When he glanced up, he caught Maddie's eyes staring at him in the rearview mirror but was unable to decipher the look in her violet eyes. He blinked innocently in response as she pulled the car into reverse and backed out of the driveway.

"The ghost is by the school," Jack announced, checking the handheld GPS device that displayed the location of the spectral signature.

"On it!" Maddie threw the car into drive and hit the gas.

Vlad gripped the armrests tightly, his body growing rigid as the vehicle barreled through the streets. His dark blue eyes darted toward Phantom sitting perched on the seat beside him. He leaned this way and that way as the vehicle turned, and a smile was on his face like the crazy driving was a common thing for him. Vlad imagined it would be since Phantom was, after all, Jack and Maddie's son. The ghost probably had a million tales to tell about his parents' terrifying driving. When the car came to a stop, Vlad was thankful for his seatbelt because if he wasn't wearing it, he would have slammed into the seat in front of him.

"Be prepared for anything," Jack warned as the weapon in his hand made a whirring noise as it charged. "We don't know what sort of abilities this ghost might have."

Vlad nodded, though he knew quite well how to fight another ghost. That, however, was with his own powers, not with an ecto based weapon. He glanced over the weapon in his hands, long and sleek and fairly light.

"Need any help with that?" Phantom asked with a smirk and a teasing note in his voice.

"I'm sure I can handle it just fine." Vlad freed the safety and jerked down the piece along the barrel. The weapon whined to life, much like with Jack's weapon. He sent a smirk to the ghost as he moved to climb out of the vehicle. "You should be careful not to get in the way. Maddie might have excellent aim, but Jack can be," he cringed slightly, "less so."

"You don't have to tell me." Phantom hopped out of the vehicle after him, and they followed Jack and Maddie who were already charging through the crowd of students milling about outside the high school. Phantom stuck close to Vlad, and his head remained bowed, eyes glued to the ground.

"Good thing Danny's parents showed up," a woman said as they neared the doors, and Vlad recognized her as the woman that came over to deliver the fudge. Recalling their conversations, Vlad remembered her name was Sam. His gaze slid sideways, and he noticed how tense Phantom was upon hearing his friend's voice.

"What good are Fenturd's parents?" a man questioned with a slightly nasally voice. When he glanced around, Vlad spotted a blond jock standing over a woman dressed in black and a man in a red beret. "They're completely incompetent!"

"They're better than those goons plastering themselves all over the TV!" Sam argued, glaring at the jock. Vlad smirked, seeing that she wasn't about to sit back and let some jock bully her.

"Che!" The jock snorted, folding his arms over his broad chest with his football jersey dirty with grass stains as he turned his head away. An odd look played across his face as he frowned at the school building. "Things were a lot better back then."

If they said anything else, Vlad missed it as he and Phantom passed through the doors and entered the high school. He caught sight of Jack and Maddie down the hall, but he turned his gaze onto Phantom. "Are you okay?" he asked in concern, wondering how much it hurt the ghost to see his friends but to never have them know he was right there next to them.

Phantom lifted his head, sadness in his green eyes before his gaze turned hard with determination. "The ghost is just up ahead," he stated, giving no response to the question. "We should go help them." He jogged the first few steps then launched into the air, flying off after his parents. Vlad hesitated for only a moment, watching the ghost, before he followed, running to catch up with the others.


	15. Chapter 14

He burst through the doors into the cafeteria of the school, barely keeping up with the others. Phantom landed, his boots touching down on the floor as he stood several feet back from his parents. Jack and Maddie had their weapons at the ready for a fight. The ghost led them on a merry little chance around the school, and Vlad past several scorched markings all the walls, floors, and ceilings along the way. A few lockers were dented after the impact of a blast that hit them.

"Oh no," Phantom breathed out, drawing Vlad's attention. He didn't even look in the man's direction or see the confusion on Vlad's face before he spoke again. "It's Cujo. He's completely harmless. He just likes to play sometimes. Give him a squeak toy or play fetch for a little bit, and he'll return to the Ghost Zone all on his own." His expression showed his distraught over discovering what ghost they chased.

"I've got this!" Jack shouted as he took aim at the small puppy that hopped onto one of the cafeteria tables and started sniffing about like he was searching for something. He lined his gun up with his eye, and after a moment, he fired, squeezing the trigger. The blast caused a slight recoil, and Jack stumbled back a step.

Phantom shot forward, racing past his parents and speeding faster than the blast. He placed himself before the ghost and raised a shield that caused the blast to ricochet off it and slam into the ceiling. The green shield slowly faded as Phantom lowered his arms with a hard look on his face.

"What are you doing?" Maddie questioned, sounding more confused by Phantom's actions than angry that he stopped them from catching the ghost.

"I just-" Phantom glanced toward Vlad with some hesitation, like he was looking for answers to give his parents. "He's harmless." He waved an arm back toward the puppy.

"I think what Phantom is trying to say is that for some ghosts, violence isn't a necessity in getting rid of them," Vlad said as he strode forward to stand before his friends. "I mean, look at him." He gestured back to the puppy, much like Phantom had. The ghost sat on his hunches and tilted his head at them. His purple hung out of his mouth as he panted. "He's just a puppy. You probably could lure him to you with a simple squeak toy rather than firing shots at him."

Maddie shouldered her bazooka as a frown creased her face. "I suppose there is some sense to that logic," she mumbled though she didn't look entirely convinced. She glanced past Vlad and Phantom to the green puppy as he scratched at his ear with a hind paw. "He does seem all dog like. It wouldn't be that farfetched to believe something as simple as a squeak toy would draw his attention to us."

Jack's mouth pursed to one side as he scratched at the back of his head. "I guess we never really thought about it like that."

"I know there are a lot of ghosts out there where fighting is the only way to deal with them," Phantom said as he walked over to stand before his parents. "But there are also plenty of ghosts out there that are pretty peaceful. Cujo's just a playful puppy. He probably only came to the high school because a lot of kids are around here and he wanted to play with them. He isn't going to harm any of them." He half turned back to the table as he put two fingers into his mouth and blew a sharp whistle that made the puppy's ears perk up.

"Hey," Jack said, pointing a finger at Phantom. "I taught my boy to whistle like that when he was seven."

Vlad caught a flash of hurt in Phantom's eyes as the ghost watched the puppy jump down from the table. Jack made a connection between Phantom and his son, but it wasn't enough to allow him to realize they were one in the same. The whistling was just mere coincidence in Jack's mind.

The puppy almost reached them, trotting the short distance from the table to where they stood, when an explosion shook the building. Jack pulled Maddie closer to him, hugging his larger body around her to protect her from any flying debris as the wall burst open. Phantom grabbed hold of Vlad, yanking him closer to where Maddie and Jack stood. A shield of green quickly went up around them to save them from the chunks of brick that rained down on them.

"What was that?" Vlad shouted, rage cursing through his veins as he glanced around through the settling dust to figure out why the wall just exploded. His anger stemmed from the fact that he didn't even realize the attack was coming. He was supposed to be helping Phantom protect Jack, and he failed to be aware enough to notice the potential attack. Was it another hit man? His dark blue eyes snapped around, searching for anyone sneaking through the cover of dust to get at Jack.

The ghost puppy had scrambled away right when the explosion hit, and now he sat cowering under one of the tables at the far end of the cafeteria. Phantom dropped the shield around them the second they weren't in danger of being harmed. Vlad frowned when he noticed the ghost moving around to stand behind his parents, almost like he was using Jack's large body to hide himself.

"The Fentons," a man said with a sneer in his voice, and Vlad twisted around to see a tall man with his bald head almost shining under the lights of the cafeteria, now that the air was clear again. He wore a white suit, like the men that Vlad saw briefly in the commercial. "I should have known you would be here making a mess of everything."

Vlad leaned sideways and stared blandly past the man toward the hole in the cafeteria wall where several other men dressed in similar white suits were climbing through the hole and spilling into the building. "It seems to me that you're the ones making the mess," he said and straightened his stance with a severe frown. "The Fentons, meanwhile, only did minor property damage to the school."

"This is a job for the professionals," the man stated, and Vlad assumed the man stared at him because he couldn't actually see the man's eyes behind his sunglasses. "Civilians," he scowled as he said the word, "should stay out of the way. We've got things handled here."

Maddie stomped up to the man with fury storming in her violet eyes. "Look here!" She jabbed a finger into his chest. "We might not have a big corporation with money weaseled out of the public, but we at least wouldn't blast down a wall of a school without checking that the area was cleared. You put our lives at risk with that stupid, reckless action."

The man took hold of her hand and pushed it away from his chest, smoothing down his suit with his free hand. "As detailed in the information packet we've passed out to all places of business and education, when a ghost is sighted, they are to evacuate the area for our arrival for the very purpose of eliminating any potential harm to civilians. You should have listened to our instructions." A smirk tugged at his mouth. "Though I'm not sure why you even bother to show up. When have you ever captured a ghost?"

Maddie looked ready to attack the man, but Jack held her back. He wore a frown, which seemed unusual after his earlier show of excitement when it came to the white suited men's weaponry. But his ability to capture a ghost was being insulted, and that, Vlad knew, was a sure way to incur the man's anger. Jack could put up with a lot, even forgive someone like Vlad, but once his ghost hunting abilities were called into question, any thought of the man laughing it off flew out the window.

"You think you can do a better job than us?" Jack stated, and Vlad really didn't like that eerie, flat tone of a serious Jack. It was simply too unnatural compared to the jolly man he knew so well.

"Of course!" The man snorted in derision. "Look!" He pointed toward the far end of the cafeteria where some of the other men were closing in on the table where the ghost puppy hid. Some of them had nets that glowed green while others held long rods that had a green loop at the end. "In a matter of seconds, we'll have the ghost secured and the children can get back to their silly little game."

"Football is _not_ a silly little game, you uncultured swine!" Vlad shouted at the man. He might not have many passions in his life since the accident and becoming a hit man, but football would always remain as a strong love of his. The bald man, however, didn't seem affected by the insult thrown at him.

"Vlad, please," Jack said gently, placing a hand on the man's shoulder. "I think we should test just how good these," his mouth pursed slightly like he bit into a sour lemon, "so-called professionals really are." He placed two fingers to his mouth like Phantom did earlier and gave a sharp whistle that made Vlad wince. "Hey, puppy! Go fetch!" he shouted once he had Cujo's attention. He drew back his arm then swung it in the direction of the hole in the wall, like he had thrown something for the puppy to chase.

Cujo's head snapped toward the direction he thought Jack threw something. Excitement lit up his eyes as his tail wagged so fast it shook his back end. Darting out from his hiding spot, he wove among the white suited men, slipping through their attempts to catch him with ease. Vlad had to smirk, impressed by the puppy's wiliness to best the men.

"Capture that ghost already!" Mr. Bald Head shouted at his subordinates with anger in his voice. He was clearly not pleased that his men couldn't catch a single ghost puppy.

Three men leapt at the puppy, attempting to tackle the poor ghost. For one heart stopping moment, Vlad thought they succeeded, piling on top of the puppy that halted when their shadows loomed over him. He wanted the puppy to escape and not simply because he was a ghost. Vlad didn't want these moronic men in their silly white suits to be the ones to capture the ghost. Then suddenly, the puppy sprouted up until his head nearly reached the ceiling. He released a vicious growl as he shook his body. The three men that were dangling upon his sides lost their hold and fell free, hitting the ground with loud thuds. The huge dog continued to chase the invisible object that Jack threw, his paws crushing everything along the way.

"Don't just sit there like useless lumps!" A vein nearly popped on the side of Mr. Bald Head's head as he screamed at his men. When he spun around to face their grouping, he pointed at them, his face red with rage. "This isn't over, Fenton. We can slap you with a lawsuit for interfering with our jobs." He turned sharply on his heels and followed his men out of the cafeteria to pursue the ghost puppy.

"As disappointed as I am that the ghost escaped, I think that was worth it," Jack said, hands on his hips as he nodded firmly. "Although that sudden growth kind of caught me by surprise."

"I should have warned about that," Phantom said, reappearing behind them, and Vlad only realized then that the ghost had gone invisible while the other ghost hunters were present. "He only turns big when he's angry or feels threatened. But as long as you approach him in a friendly manner, you don't have to worry about him attacking."

"Well, I certainly won't be disappointed if he ends up trashing some of their equipment," Maddie said, folding her arms with a furious glare. "I'm sick of dealing with those idiots always butting into _our_ work. I wish they would just leave Amity Park already."

"How long have they been in town?" Vlad questioned as he frowned around at the damage to the cafeteria. The scorches and dented lockers would cost a bit to repair but were nothing that had to be dealt with right away since they didn't impede the school's ability to educate its students. The hole in the wall, on the other hand, would cost a lot more to repair and take much more time and would want to be started right away. Schools, if Vlad recalled things correctly, didn't have huge budgets for repairing this type of damage on a regular basis. Taking funds away to fix what those goons did would take money away from other things that were important to the school, like funding different programs, especially the ones that were already fairly underfunded already. His mouth pressed thin as he thought about it. Those men in the white suits didn't seem like they were the type to care about helping to repair what they destroyed.

"Hm," Jack said thoughtful as his hand ran through his hair. "I suppose it would be a little over half a year." He shrugged, his gaze sweeping over the cafeteria. "We better go tell them that the ghost is gone." A frown stayed on his face. "They're going to blame us for this."

Maddie sighed as she placed a hand on her husband's arm. "They always do. Okay. Sometimes some of the damage is our fault. We won't deny that. But we get blamed for their destruction too." She frowned dryly, unhappy to be blamed for other people's actions. "Well, let's get it over with." She led the way out of the cafeteria with Jack a step behind her.

"So," Vlad said as he hung back with Phantom, "trying to convince your parents to change their opinions on ghosts?" He lifted a curious eyebrow.

"Well," Phantom drew out the word as he tilted his head to one side, "I doubt they'll completely change. But maybe they can start to see that not all ghosts are evil, violent entities." His green eyes glanced toward Vlad. "If you can treat a ghost like a person, maybe there's some hope for them."

Vlad stared at Phantom. His situation for understanding more about ghosts was very different, but he thought, maybe, Phantom had a point. Maddie and Jack actually stopped to listen to what Phantom had to say about Cujo. Maybe they _could_ change their opinion of ghosts. Or at the very least, they might be able to learn to understand ghosts a little better. Maybe, Vlad's jaw set with a nervous twisting inside him, he might be able to tell them the truth about what happened in the accident at some point in the future.


	16. Chapter 15

That principal, Ms. Ishiyama, really knew how to rant. As soon as she saw the damage to the cafeteria, she went off on a tirade, wagging her fingers at Jack and Maddie with complaints about how they had no respect for the school or people's property. Vlad could see the anger in both his friends, but Maddie and Jack stayed silent, allowing the principal to scream until she ran out of steam. Or she would have, if the vice principal, Mr. Lancer, didn't step in to cut off her long winded speech. The man, though overweight, seemed to be quite wise as he pointed out the impossibility of Jack and Maddie creating the damage done to the cafeteria with the equipment they had. The bazooka that Maddie held was powerful, yes, but the rounds loaded into it were meant for capture rather than for destruction. Maddie even demonstrated by firing off a round that left a mess of sticky ectoplasm plastered to one of the walls. It would take a bit of time to clean up, but it proved that she couldn't have burst the hole through the wall.

"I don't think I gave him enough credit when I was alive," Phantom mumbled to Vlad. "I was always getting into trouble because of bullies. You know, because jocks were never allowed to get in trouble." He rolled his eyes, slight annoyance leaking through into his expression. "But it's nice to see that Lancer can see my parents aren't always to blame for property damage."

Vlad wasn't surprised to hear that jocks still tended to get special treatment. He remembered being harassed by jocks when he was in high school too. His teachers always seemed to turn a blind eye to the bullying if the jock was a star player on a sports team that brought money to the school. They never wanted to risk their chance of win championships.

By the time the principal and vice principal allowed them to leave, the gathering of students outside the front of the school departed. They heard noise from the football field, cheers of the students in the stands, and Vlad assumed that they decided to continue with the game now that the threat of a ghost was gone. Not all the students returned to the game, however, they discovered when they reached the Assault Vehicle. Sam who dressed mostly in black and the man with the beret that Vlad noticed before with the woman waited there for them.

"Tucker, Sam," Maddie said in surprise to find the pair of teenagers. "Shouldn't you have gone back to the game?"

Tucker glanced to the woman at his side with a nervous look in his green eyes.

"My dad called earlier," Sam said, rubbing at one arm as her violet eyes, that reminded Vlad too much of Maddie's eyes, looked away. "He said the hospital called because my mom didn't show up for work. She's always so prompt and on time for everything, so when she didn't come right at the start of her shift, they decided to contact us and see if there was anything wrong." She frowned as she looked at Maddie and Jack. Vlad tried not to show his surprise, but he thought they would have more time before having to worry about Pamela's "disappearance" becoming a topic of concern. It wasn't more than eight hours since they locked Pamela up in the ghost containment unit. "My dad said that the last time he saw her, my mom was bringing over a pie to your house. Do you know what happened after that?"

Maddie and Jack exchanged looks, and Vlad doubted they wanted to lie to the young woman. However, saying something along the lines of "your mother tried to kill me so we locked her up" probably wouldn't come off well to Sam.

"We haven't seen your mother in days," Jack said without a hint of deception. "Perhaps something came up before she could make it to our house." He walked past the teenagers to climb into the passenger's seat.

"Sorry." Maddie frowned convincingly with concern. "I wish we could help." She placed a hand on Sam's arm and gave it a squeeze. "I hope she turns up soon." Then she walked around to the driver's side of the vehicle.

"Well, on the bright side, you don't have to deal with her trying to put in one of those god awful dresses," Tucker said, trying to cheer up his friend. Vlad glanced toward Phantom as he climbed into the vehicle with Jack and Maddie.

"I suppose you're right," Sam said with a frown that showed the joking comment didn't lessen her concerns about her mother. Phantom watched his friends, and his green gaze filled with sadness when the pair of teenagers looked his way. Vlad thought there was something in their eyes, some spark of almost recognition, before Sam took hold of Tucker's hand to pull him away. "Maybe if we retrace her steps, we'll find out what happened."

Vlad turned his head to stare into the front room where Phantom was, for once, floating. The ghost had his legs folded under him, and his eyes were closed, almost looking like he was meditating. Jack and Maddie were upstairs, in bed, already, and Vlad knew that he would have to go up soon and get some rest too. But these quiet moments, when it was only he and Phantom, were nice and gave him the chance to speak openly with the ghost. He wanted to say something, comfort the ghost somehow, but the words failed him before he could even open his mouth.

"So," Phantom opened his eyes, catching hold of Vlad's gaze, "football?" A sly smirk spread over his face.

The eerie quiet that fell over them, putting him on edge as his muscles tensed, broke after that question. "What about it?" Vlad asked, lifting his eyebrows in curiosity.

Phantom shrugged then looked away as he scratched his cheek with one finger. "I guess, I just never saw you as the type to like football. Maybe we should have stayed to watch the end of the game."

"You should see my castle." Vlad laughed, shaking his head. "The front hall is completely covered in the colors of the Green Bay Packers."

Phantom cracked a grin with a small chuckle. "For some reason, I'm not even the tiniest bit surprised you have a castle." He wrinkled his nose a touch as he stared at Vlad. "Somehow, that just seems really fitting."

"When we were roommates in college, your dad and I used to watch football every time there was a game." Vlad smiled fondly as he thought back on those memories. "You should have seen us. We'd be cheering when our team scored and shouting whenever the ref made a stupid call, screaming at the players when we didn't think they were making the right play. Next to working on our inventions, those were the best times. Really," his mouth twitched, "great times."

"You know, it's not too late." Phantom floated over and touched down on the ground before where Vlad sat on the steps. "Dad would probably love to start watching footballs games with you again. You already," he shrugged, "seem to have forgiven him. I think so, anyway." He bit his lower lip, chewing on it in worry.

Vlad nodded. "Yeah, I think I have," he agreed. Though the words weren't said out loud, he felt like inside he had forgiven Jack already for the accident. "And I should thank you."

"Me?" Phantom looked stunned then shook his head. "I didn't do anything."

"But you did. You made me stop and think and realize the truth of what I was feeling." Vlad smiled up at the ghost. "So thank you." Even in the darkness of the front hall, Vlad could make out the soft blush of green upon the ghost's cheeks.

"W-Well, I'm glad I could help then!" Phantom smiled awkwardly back at Vlad. "You know," he said slowly as he looked shyly away, "you should talk more about yourself. When I realized you liked football, it was so whoa!" His eyes bugged out for a moment as his hands went up to his face, his fingers springing outward. He gave a quiet chuckle. "I mean, you've told me some stuff about you, but learning that you liked something just makes it feel like you're a real person. Uh, I mean, like, not the cold hearted assassin that cares for nothing beyond completing an assignment. Um-" He snapped his mouth shut, dropping his gaze out of embarrassment. "Sorry. That was kind of rude."

Vlad shook his head. "I think I've forgotten, sometimes, about interests and hobbies I had in the past. I've been running around taking on so many assignments that I barely had two seconds to myself to really think about anything else. All part of burying the truth of everything so that I wouldn't have to stop blaming everything on Jack."

"Is that what attracted you to the idea of being a hit man?"

"Quite possibly." Vlad knew he could have gotten a normal job that offered him plenty of money, but something drew him to become a hit man, and the anger and bitterness he felt could be a large part of that. His ghost powers certainly helped him become rather successful in that profession. They fell silent for a time as thoughts turned in their heads. The reminder of his job brought Vlad back to thinking of whom would want Jack dead and why. He turned his gaze onto the ghost as a thread of an idea dangled in his mind. "Who exactly were those men tonight?"

Phantom blinked, the question taking him by surprised. "You mean the Guys in White?"

Vlad stared blandly back at the ghost. "Guys in White? Their wit astounds me," he said flatly.

"Yeah, the name is kind of stupid." Phantom shrugged. "I guess it was around four years ago, give or take, when they first became public knowledge. A news crew caught them in the act of fighting a ghost, and from there, their corporation slowly built and spread around the world." His brow wrinkled as his gaze remained on Vlad, like he was trying to figure out the man's thinking by asking about the Guys in White.

"And they set up camp here in Amity Park a little over six months ago?"

"Pretty much." Phantom nodded. "Makes sense. I mean, we do get more than the average ghost haunting around here."

"And when exactly did those attacks on Jack's life start?" A part of Vlad hoped his thinking was flawed, but at the moment, it was the only idea he had that would make any sense.

"I guess that was about the same-" Phantom froze, his eyes growing a touch wider. "Wait. Are you thinking that the Guys in White are trying to kill Dad?"

"Who else would have a better motive?" Vlad watched the ghost closely, seeing the connections being made within his mind. "Your parents are ghost hunters. And seeing as we got there first, I'm willing to bet that their technology is far better than what the Guys in White have. It would make sense that the Guys in White would want your parents out of the way to create a monopoly on ghost hunting. I've seen it before. One big corporation tries to squash out the small companies to eliminate the competition. Sometimes they'll try to buy out the company or bankrupt it, defame it. Anything really to achieve their goal. I've even had a client hire me to take out the president of a rival company in hopes that it would collapse on itself without its head to run it."

Phantom frowned as he listened to Vlad. "They did come round when they first arrived in town." His brow creased with a troubled look in his eyes. "They offered my parents a million dollars for every bit of ghost hunting tech they owned."

"A million dollars?" Vlad snorted derisively. "Your parents' work is worth a lot more than that."

"Dad said you couldn't put a price on someone's passion." Phantom shrugged. "They love what they do. They're not going to let some big corporation buy out everything they've worked on."

"And that's why they're a threat in the minds of the Guys in White," Vlad said, lifting a hand to point a finger at the ghost. "They can't be bought out or run out of town. The Guys in White can try to make Jack and Maddie look like idiots in the public eye, dangerous menaces, but that won't stop them. Jack and Maddie don't care what the public thinks of them. They're doing what they love, and public opinion won't stop that. The only way the Guys in White have left to get rid of them is by killing them."

Phantom gulped, and it was clear from fear in his eyes that those words unsettled him. It only added proof to his thinking that the string of hit men trying to kill Jack would never end until his father was dead. "We have to stop this." His voice shook slightly with worry for his father.

Vlad's mouth pressed thin. A big corporation wouldn't be easy to take down, not one as wide spread as the Guys in White seemed to be. "We'll need to do some research. Do you have a computer somewhere?"

"Yeah, there's one in my room." Phantom hopped over Vlad, using his ability to fly to make his jump higher and longer as he landed half way up the stairs. Then he climbed the rest of the way to the second floor. Vlad followed after him, and they walked down the hall to the ghost's bedroom. "But why do you need the computer?"

"We've got a little researching to do." Vlad smirked as he flipped on the ancient machine that collected dust over time. The computer was four years out of date, but it would still work well enough for his purposes. He sat down at the desk ready to begin digging up information on the Guys in White.

Phantom stiffened suddenly, his head snapping around to stare toward the doorway. "Dad," he whispered with a hint of worry that made a chill wash down Vlad's backside. Phantom shot into the air, flying out of the room in a flash.

Vlad quickly typed out a message coded so that only one being would be able to find it and understand the meaning of it. Then he got to his feet and scrambled out of the room to quickly follow after the ghost. He failed to hear the noise right away, too engrossed in figuring out how to stop the Guys in White. The creak of the window opening was too soft for his ears to pick up, or perhaps a ghost's hearing was just far better than a human's hearing. Vlad raced down the hall to Jack and Maddie's bedroom, and when he reached the door, he heard the sounds of a fight already taking place beyond it. Throwing the door open, he prepared to join the fight. A body slammed into the wall next to where he stood, and he jerked, unable to stop that instinct to flinch when something flew at him. Maddie sank to her knees, holding a hand around her waist as she winced. A bruise was already darkening upon the left side of her forehead, and a trickle of blood dripped from a cut on the corner of her mouth.

Vlad wanted to check on her. He wanted to kneel down at her side and tend to her wounds. But Jack was still at risk, and Maddie would want him to keep Jack's safety as his first priority. His eyes snapped around the dark room until they landed on Phantom who ducked as the hit man dressed in black punched at him. If Maddie was hurt, the assassin was clearly on a better level than Pamela Manson.

"Jack, get Maddie out of here," Vlad ordered.

"I can still-" Maddie tried to climbed to her feet but gasped out in pain before she could finish her protest. Jack didn't argue with Vlad, though he looked halfway tempted to protest in order to give the assassin a good butt kicking for hurting his wife. Vlad couldn't blame the man, because he wanted to hurt the hit man for that reason too. Jack was careful not to cause any more pain to his wife, easing her arm around his body as they passed Vlad on their way through the door.

When he turned back to the fight, Vlad saw Phantom throw the attacker over his shoulder, reminding him of when Maddie did the same to Pamela. A smirk tugged at his mouth. Phantom was definitely Maddie's child. The ghost moved to follow up and punch the man, but the assassin suddenly struck Phantom in the ribs with something that looked like a black baton. Phantom grunted, and if he was human, the blow might have bruised his ribs. A scream filled the air as white sparks danced from the baton to Phantom, coursing over his body in waves that made his body spasm.

The sound of Phantom in agony kicked Vlad into action. He was content to stand back and allow Phantom to fight without his interference, but now he rushed forward. No thoughts ran through his head other than he needed to help Phantom. His hand glowed pink, and he transformed, dark rings passing over his body without his notice. The energy ball fired from his hand, screaming toward the hit man until it slammed into his arm. The assassin shouted in pain as the baton flew from his grasp, banged against the wall, then thumped upon the floor. Phantom hit the ground, collapsing after the surge of electricity that left his body twitching now and then. Vlad ignored that for the moment, flinging out his arm and throwing ectoplasm at the hit man that bound his arms to the floor.

"You," Vlad growled, pinning the man down under his weight as his face came within inches of the assassin's face, "do not get to hurt the people I care about." His hand closed around the man throat, squeezing until it felt like the pressure would crush his throat. The man thrashed under him as he gasped for air, and Vlad watched that surge of panic in his eyes, that look of fear that the end was near for him. With his powers, he could do so much worse than simply choke the assassin. He could turn his hand intangible and reach into the man's chest and hold his heart right in the palm of his hand. He was so used to killing, taking lives for more than two decades. This was no different. This was easy. He felt no remorse ending the life of someone that hurt Maddie. That hurt Phantom. That wanted to hurt Jack.

Something made him stop. Vlad wished he could say it was some inner goodness that told him killing this man would be wrong, but it wasn't. A flash a light in the peripheral caught his attention, and he turned his head, loosening his hold on the man's throat. There was no cough or sharp intake of breath to signal the assassin was still alive, but Vlad knew the man hadn't expired yet. When he looked toward Phantom, Vlad's jaw dropped open, his red eyes staring but not believing what he saw. Phantom with ebony hair. Phantom who looked human, who looked alive, not like the ghost that Vlad came to know.


	17. Chapter 16

The hit man lay unconscious on the floor, wrapped up tightly in pink ropes made of ectoplasm. It didn't seem like he would be waking up anytime soon, but Vlad didn't want to take any chances by ignoring him. Once the assassin was securely bound, Vlad scrambled over to where Phantom lay not moving on the floor. He touched a hand to Phantom's shoulder, not quite as muscled as he recalled the ghost being. Human, Vlad corrected his way of identifying Phantom in his head as he stared at the raven locks. Phantom was human.

It was like getting punched in the stomach with an energy ball that left him gasping for air. Phantom was human. Vlad could feel the faint pulse of life under his fingers, after removing the black gloves he wore in his ghost form, as he pressed them to the man's throat. Phantom was alive, but he was a ghost. Vlad nearly backed away from him in shock, gasping as it really hit him. Phantom was like him. Phantom was half ghost too.

Vlad shook his head. Now was not the time to get lost on that fact when there were more important things on which to focus. Phantom might still be alive, but his condition wasn't as good as it could be. Four years passed. That time repeated in Vlad's mind. Phantom thought he was dead for the last four years. Phantom's human body grew during that time, but he had that stretched appearance to him. The muscles that he built as the ghost known as Phantom didn't fully transfer over to his human body. The raggedy shirt and torn jeans that he wore added to that pulled look as the clothes no longer fit him. A disturbing thought occurred to Vlad. The only time Phantom ate during those four years was when Vlad placed a plate of food in front of him. Recovery from that duration of not eating would require him to slowly be reintroduced to food in his human form.

"Maddie! Jack!" Vlad shouted as he rushed toward the door of the bedroom. The light in the hall was on when he stepped out of the room, and he squinted as his eyes adjusted to the light.

Jack stuck his head out of the bathroom with his brow creased in confusion. Then his eyes flew wide, and his hands scrambled at his jumpsuit like he was searching for a weapon. "Ghost!"

Vlad blinked then dropped his gaze and took in the white suit of his ghost form. In his panic at discovering that Phantom was still alive, he forgot to change back. "Wait!" he shouted, arms raised out before him. The black rings passed over him, reverting his appearance back to that of Vlad Masters.

Jack's jaw nearly dropped to the floor. "W-What?"

"What's going on?" Maddie questioned, stepping around her husband as she zipped up her jumpsuit. The blood was wiped clean from her mouth, and a small square bandaged was taped over the bruise on her forehead. Her arm wrapped around her waist, and even after being bandaged, the bruised ribs still hurt. Vlad could tell by the wince on her face when she moved.

"He - He-" Jack stuttered out, having trouble getting his words out as he pointed a finger at Vlad. He snapped his head toward his wife and whispered, "He's a ghost!"

Vlad sighed, rubbing at his forehead. This was not the time to have this discussion with his friends, but perhaps it would make seeing Phantom easier on them. "Yes, I'm half ghost," he explained tiredly, and his friends gave him confused looks. "That accident with the Proto Portal. When it exploded in my face, it did more than give me that case of ecto acne. It also infused my DNA with ectoplasm, giving me ghost powers."

"What?" Maddie stared, stunned. "Why didn't you ever tell us?"

"Yeah!" Jack frowned, pouting with hurt in his eyes. "You could have told us."

"Perhaps I should have. But I wasn't in a good place after all that." Vlad felt impatience rising in him. "But we can deal with that later. Phantom needs help. Now!" He darted back into the bedroom, flipping the light switch as he entered. When light filled the room, the sight of Phantom's still form tore at his heart. Curled up on his side with his arms crossed over his chest, Phantom looked like someone could have just beaten him, if he had bruises to show for it. Maddie and Jack pressed in behind him, and Vlad moved aside to allow them to enter the room too.

Maddie gasped, hands flying to her mouth. "No!" Her steps were hesitant before she rushed over to Phantom's side and knelt down beside him.

"How?" Jack asked numbly, staring at mother and son. "How is Danny here?"

Danny? So that was Phantom's living name. "He was always here," Vlad answered seriously as he turned his gaze onto his friend.

"What do you mean?" Jack shouted, grabbing hold of Vlad in a grip that hurt. "What do you mean our son was always here? How? We searched for him. We searched for months without finding any hint of him."

"Phantom _is_ Danny!" Vlad shouted, glaring right back at Jack. He phased himself free of the tight hold and rubbed at his sore arm. "He's like me. He can turn ghost, but he's _still alive_. He's been here this whole time, doing everything in his power to protect you. To keep his family safe even though he was hurting inside."

"How long have you known this?" Jack demanded, hurt and pain in his eyes.

"That's _not_ important, Jack!" Maddie shouted with such firmness that both men stopped themselves from continuing their yelling. "Danny's _alive_." Tears were streaming down her face, tears of a happy mother reunited at long last with her missing son. "I don't care if he's half ghost. I don't care who knew and for how long. All I care about is Danny. He's here. He's right here." Her fingers threaded carefully through her son's raven hair like she feared hurting him.

"Sorry," Jack mumbled, bowing his head with a look of shame upon his face. "We've just - We always hoped maybe, one day, we'd discover that Danny wasn't really dead."

Vlad realized it then, that they only announced their son as dead because they never found the body. "What exactly happened back then?"

Jack hunched his shoulders in a shrug. "We don't really know. Not the full details. It was the day we finished up work on the Ghost Portal. We were so excited, thinking at last it would work. But we plugged it in and," he frowned with a distant look in his eyes, "nothing happened. It didn't work. We were so disappointed. Twenty years of hard work to build it, redesigning it a bunch of times before figuring out one we were certain would work. It wasn't even the first time we finished building one. But, at that time, we were just hit with such a wave of hopelessness. We gave up." He laughed bitterly. "I thought it was such a brilliant idea in college. Punch a hole between the worlds so that we could go in and explore the Ghost Zone. What a joke."

"We were in the kitchen," Maddie continued, staring down at her son, "wallowing in our failure. Then we heard the screams. Danny had his friends over, and they were still in the lab after we gave up. We raced back down there to find Sam and Tucker freaking out. The doors to the Portal were open, and it was working. We could see a glimpse into the Ghost Zone!" She frowned sadly. "But Danny was gone. Even after we got his friends to calm down, their answers to our questions didn't make any sense. Danny was in the Portal when it opened? We didn't understand. We didn't-" She hung her head.

Vlad's eyes widened as he listened to the story. "It's just like me," he muttered, rubbing a hand over his face. "He got caught up in the Portal, and activating it turned him into a half ghost."

After one more moment of hesitation, Jack crossed over to join his wife at his son's side. "Everyone thinks he's dead. How are we supposed to even explain any of," he gestured awkwardly at his son, " this? We can't tell anyone the truth about where he's been for the last four years. How has his human side even survived this long?"

"His ghost side most likely sustained his human side," Vlad explained, cycling through his own knowledge of being half ghost to find an explanation. "It could keep him alive, probably converting his ectoplasm into a sustenance that would preserve the human half. Sort of like the idea of a ghost possessing a corpse and maintaining it so that it doesn't rot right away. It kept his human side alive, but almost like it was in a stasis. His body continued to grow, but the muscles didn't develop, leaving him with this stretched out appearance. If he starts eating properly again and exercising his human body, he'll be able to return to normal. Probably faster than a normal human because of his ghost powers. They help quite a lot where healing is concerned." Vlad discovered it early on when his ghost half was hurt, it only transferred over to his human half when it was a serious injury. He also noticed that his injuries would heal much faster than before the accident.

Phantom - No, he was Danny now. Vlad would have to get used to thinking of him by his human name. Danny stirred, his long fingers twitching as he moaned. His eyes opened, and he had the brightest blue eyes despite the shadows hanging over them. His gaze blearily drifted from the floor upward until it landed on his parents over him.

"Mom? Dad?" Danny's voice was hoarse, and swallowing twisted his face with pain. It took a moment. Then his eyes grew wide with panic as he sat up and scrambled away from them. "No! I didn't mean - I didn't-"

"Shh! Danny, it's okay," Maddie said gently, holding out a hand toward her son, but she didn't touch him. She kept her hand a safe distance away from him, not wanting to scare him.

Danny stared unbelieving at his parents. It was a big shock for him after four years of his parents not seeing him as anything but a ghost. Then his gaze shot to Vlad, still standing close to the door, and betrayal shone in his eyes. Vlad cringed internally, feeling that look stab at him.

"Look at yourself," Vlad said, clenching his hands behind his back. He didn't tell Jack and Maddie to betray Danny. He told them because they needed to know that their son was still alive. If he wanted, Danny didn't have to forgive him for that, but Vlad thought of no other way to hide the truth in this case.

Danny hesitantly tore his gaze away from Vlad and dropped it to look down at himself. He lifted a hand, curling his long fingers slowly before uncurling them. He stared at his hand, no longer gloved, like he couldn't believe what he saw. Then he looked over his body, tentatively touching it and feeling the firmness of his flesh where his torn clothes didn't cover him. With a gasp, he hunched forward, pressing a hand to his chest.

"I'm-" Danny lifted his head and glanced at the three adults in the room with complete and utter disbelief in his blue eyes. "I'm alive?"

Vlad had feared that would be the case. It explained why he didn't eat during the time he went by Phantom. Danny thought he died. "What happened to you four years ago?" His throat felt dry, tight, almost having to force the words out of his mouth. It was probably something that Phantom didn't want to think about, much less talk about with them.

"I-" Danny swallowed as he glanced between his parents, who kept close to him but allowed him his space. "After the Portal didn't start up, Sam, Tuck, and I were all curious about it. I mean, a way to see into the world beyond our own? It would be cool to see what it would be like. After hearing Mom and Dad talk about it all the time, I couldn't help but want to check it out. I went into the Portal." He drew his knobby knees up to his chest. "I was just going to take a look, see if there was anything off inside. I didn't really know what I was looking for though. I mean, I don't know as much about that stuff. And then-" He hesitated, his body trembling. "It hurt so much. I felt like my skin was being burned off while my insides turned to ice." He closed his eyes, brow creasing like he was trying to fight off the memory of that experience. "When I woke up, I was in the Ghost Zone. I thought - How could I think that didn't kill me? It was so painful. I thought for sure I had died. I didn't even _look_ human anymore!"

"Danny, it's okay," Jack said in a gentle tone. "It's okay now." He cautiously inched closer to his son like he was approaching a wounded cat that might strike at him if he moved too fast. There was a moment as they stared at each other before Danny crawled forward and threw his arms around his father's body. Next to his father, Danny looked smaller, more like a child than a teenager as Jack's large form practically engulfed him. Tears fell from his eyes before he buried his face against his father. Maddie moved in closer to join the family hug while Vlad stayed where he stood by the door, feeling a pang in his chest as he witnessed the happy family reunion.


	18. Chapter 17

Vlad left the Fenton family alone, taking his time dragging the latest hit man down the stairs with a certain sense of vicious justice with each thump and thud of the man's body banging on each step. When he reached the laboratory, he saw Pamela curled up in one corner of the ghost containment unit. If she made any attempts to break free, Vlad couldn't see the evidence of it anywhere on the thick glass. After he checked the man over for hidden weapons or anything else that might allow him to escape. Vlad tossed the hit man unceremoniously into the cell to join Pamela. The woman lifted her head, tired aqua colored eyes glaring coldly at him, but the door closed before she could even think of getting up to fight her way to freedom.

"You were hired as a hit man too," Pamela said as she sat up straight, smoothing out her dress. "Is his life really worth more than the money you'd make off this job? Our client is _very_ wealthy, after all. You could be set for life if you completed the assignment."

"His life is worth it to me," Vlad said coolly, narrowing his dark blue eyes. He knew she was trying to get into his head, twist him back to his earlier way of thinking so that he would want to complete the job. "You're married to a wealthy man. You have a daughter. A _family_. Do you really want to throw all of that away just to kill Jack? Or do you really have no heart inside you?" The idea that Pamela would have a family and still have no emotional attachment to them sickened him. A family, having someone that cared that much for him, was something Vlad desired, now that he actually looked inside himself to discover the truth about himself. If he had a family, he wouldn't throw it away, not for any amount of money a client might throw at him.

Pamela tilted her head as she lifted an eyebrow at him. "How can you possibly like that bumbling idiot? He is a menace, and it's only by some amazing luck that he hasn't completely destroyed the town."

"I'll admit he can be an idiot sometimes," Vlad said with a dry look as he folded his arms behind his back. "But he's a good man and a good friend. Perhaps that's not something someone who only cares about herself would understand." He sneered at the woman before he turned sharply on his heels and strolled out of the laboratory.

When he went to check on the family, Vlad glanced into Jack and Maddie's bedroom. During his brief trip to the laboratory, they found a shirt for Danny to wear. It was much too large on him, and Vlad assumed that it belonged to Jack. His parents were curled up around Danny as the three of them slept on the bed. After everything that happened, Vlad wasn't surprised that Danny would be exhausted. After a good sleep, he imagined the young man would find he was starving too. A frown curved upon his face. Their ghost powers might increase their rate of healing, but it would still be wise for Danny not to stuff his face the first moment he got. 

"Vlad?"

The questioning voice tore Vlad out of his concerned thoughts about the young man. He turned his gaze onto Jack, who rubbed at his eyes as he pushed himself up on one arm. "I was just checking in," Vlad said quietly, not wanting to disturb the other two who remained asleep. After such an emotional reunion, they deserved the chance to rest.

Jack reached behind him and patted the mattress. "Plenty of room."

Vlad shook his head. "Someone should keep watch. It seems the ones that want you dead are getting impatient."

Jack frowned then eased himself off the bed, leaving wife and son asleep on the bed. After walking over to where Vlad stood, Jack placed a hand on his friend's shoulder then pulled Vlad in close for a one armed hug. "I owe you a lot," he whispered, not letting Vlad go. Even though he could slip out easily with his powers, Vlad remained where he stood. "You gave me my son back."

"I didn't really do anything," Vlad said, and it reminded him of Danny's response when he thanked him. "But I'm glad you could be reunited." He reached around and patted Jack on the back.

Vlad kept watched through what remained of the night. He patrolled invisibly around the perimeter of the house, checked on their captives in the ghost containment unit, and checked on the sleeping family. After his rounds, he would take a break to catch some rest. He knew he couldn't do his job of watching over the family if he was too exhausted from lack of sleep to fight when an attacker came.

The smell of sizzling bacon roused him in the morning. Vlad yawned as he got to his feet and headed for the kitchen. When he got there, he spotted Danny sitting at the table, still in human form. Jack got down plates from the cupboard while Maddie worked on fixing their breakfast.

"I feel like I could eat an entire cow," Danny said, chuckling. "I never felt hungry when I was a ghost."

"Going ghost tends to have that effect," Vlad commented as he joined the young man at the table. "When I first started out, I spent an entire day shadowing a target and never got hungry. When I changed back later that night, I realized just how hungry I was."

Danny blinked as he turned his head to stare at Vlad. It was strange after getting to know him as Phantom to see him with blue eyes and raven hair. Vlad could see a lot of his parents in Danny. If he kept growing as he was, Danny could probably reach his father's height.

"You-" Danny's brow creased as his brain scrambled to understand Vlad's comment. Then his eyebrows shot upward, surprise dawning in his expression. "Wait! You don't mean you're like, well, whatever I am, do you?"

Vlad nodded and leaned his chin on one hand. "I refer to my state as half ghost." He frowned as his dark blue eyes traveled up and down Danny's body. "I think it would be good, though, to spend some time as a regular human. Your human body needs to play catch up, and while your ghost abilities can help with healing, it doesn't keep your human body strong. You'll need to do some exercising, weight lifting, to build up your muscles."

"Yeah, Mom and Dad were already suggesting that to me," Danny said, rubbing at the back of his neck with a flush upon his cheeks.

"Oh," Vlad mumbled as he sat back. Of course Jack and Maddie would take charge of that sort of detail. Danny was, after all, their son, and it would be their responsibility as parents to care for their son. Vlad's advice and opinion was no longer necessary now that Danny was truly reunited with his parents again.

"But," Danny said hurriedly as he reached out and grabbed hold of Vlad's hand, squeezing it firmly, "I'd like you to help. Um, if you want to, that is, of course." He didn't let go of Vlad's hand. "I mean, well, you've been such a big support for me." A grin cracked over his face. "And maybe you can teach me a few things about my ghost powers."

"You seem to have the basics down." Vlad rubbed at his chin with his free hand as he thought back over what powers he recalled Danny using. "Flight, invisibility, shields." He blinked, surprising hitting him. "You did that little starry sky show for me, but I've never seen you fire an energy ball."

"Ah, well," Danny shrugged, "I guess I didn't really think about it. I've always been more used to the hand-to-hand fighting stuff."

"And guns?" Vlad lifted his eyebrow with a severe frown.

"Ow!" Danny winced, freeing his hand to rub at the back of his head after Maddie whacked him with a wooden spoon.

"A gun?" Maddie demanded, glaring down at her son. "Haven't I told you not to play with guns."

"I wasn't playing with it. A hit man isn't going to be intimidated if I'm using an ecto blaster," Danny explained with a frown as Jack set down plates on the table. He stared at his plate, which had much less bacon and eggs than everyone else and only half a slice of toast. "But I'm hungry!"

"Oh yes, you were quite intimidating when you sneaked up behind me with that gun," Vlad said with an amused smirk that brought a flush to Danny's face.

"We talked about this already," Jack said, dipping his knife into the butter and lifting out a generous amount that he spread onto his toast. "You might have special ghost healing powers, but we think it's best for your body to slowly reintroduce itself to food. As good as those healing abilities might be, I don't think they help the prevention of ruptured organs."

Danny groaned as he picked up a slice of bacon to eat. "It's going to be really annoying if you're going to be monitoring my eating."

"Just until you're back to normal, sweetie." Maddie kissed him on the side of the head before she sat down to eat too.

"They're just concerned about you." Vlad smirked at the glare he received from Danny, but there was some happiness behind those blue eyes. Getting frustrated about overbearing parents was a part of being alive, and even if he grumbled about it, Danny was overjoyed to have his family life back.

"So," Danny said hesitantly as he eyed Vlad, "is the half ghost thing the other part of why you hated Dad?" He cringed the moment the words left his mouth, and his gaze darted toward his father. Jack wore a hurt expression, and that killed Vlad, but perhaps talking about everything would help in the long run.

After a sigh, Vlad began, "As you know, I was in love with Maddie."

"Vlad, you know-" Maddie's expression showed hurt, and even Jack frowned, bowing his head.

"I do know," Vlad agreed. "You love Jack. I never stood a chance. But I was young and foolish and wanted what I couldn't have." He shook his head, ashamed of his younger self for acting the way he did. "Then the accident happened, and my face was hideous with the ecto acne. Then I discovered my ghost powers. Then I heard that you and Jack were getting married. I was feeling hurt and betrayed, and that twisted to anger and bitterness. I thought Jack stole you away from me with that accident. I lost my chance with you, and I put all the blame on Jack." With a frown, he poked at his eggs then slapped at Danny's fork when the young man tried to steal a bit of eggs off his plate. "But," he raised his head and stared across the table at his friends, "I realized that my affections weren't true and I had no reason to be angry at Jack. The loneliness and misery that I've gone through were my own doing. I could have lived a happier life if I let go of that anger sooner."

"I wish you would have talked to us sooner," Jack said, gazing sadly at Vlad. "But it's not too late for you to find happiness. And you'll always be welcomed here." His face broke into a wide smile.

"Of course," Maddie agreed. "And if you're looking for something to do - well, assuming you decide to give up a life of being a hit man - you can always work with us. We'd love to work on projects with you again."

Vlad's gaze turned to Danny, who had already finished his food. The young man smiled back, though it could simply be that he wanted to charm Vlad into giving him some of his breakfast. "It would indeed be nice to work with the two of you again," Vlad agreed. Then with a grin, he shoveled the last of his eggs into his mouth, and he caught a slight pout from Danny. Once he swallowed, he said, "But I do think we should think of how to explain where Danny's been these last four years. It would be best to keep the fact that a half ghost even exists from becoming public knowledge."

"Especially with the Guys in White around," Maddie said, seething as she glared so hard at the table that Vlad thought she might actually burn holes through the wood. A chill washed down Vlad's spine at the thought of the terrible experiments they might run on a half ghost if they were to ever learn of Vlad and Danny's existences. A tense silence filled the kitchen as all occupants had the same thoughts in regard to the Guys in White.

"I'm curious now." Danny leaned on his arm as he stared at Vlad. "What do you look like as a ghost?" The room seemed to relax immediately by that simple question, like somehow Danny made them all forget about the threat looming over them.

"You really want to see?" Vlad waited for Danny to nod before he let the rings of black travel over his body. Danny's hand slipped, slapping down on the table as jaw fell open in surprise. Vlad returned the shocked expression with a lift of his eyebrow. "It's not that horrible, is it?" He frowned, wondering if he should feel insulted.

"Oh no," Danny said with a shake of his head. "It looks awesome, Dracula." He wore a teasing grin as he tilted his head to one side. "Want some blood to wash down those eggs?"

"I'd be careful with your teasing. You never know if I might take you up on that offer." Vlad smirked in return, amused by that little drain of color from Danny who looked like he actually believed the older half ghost for a moment. Then he realized how that probably sounded. His gaze snapped toward Jack and Maddie, who were staring back with varying degrees of shock. He didn't know what to tell them. The comment slipped out like he and Danny were back to their little banters before everything came out. He simply felt a comfort level around Danny that allowed him to make that kind of comment.

"You shouldn't make such lame jokes," Danny said, once again breaking the silence as he laughed. "But I think you should lose that hair. It just looks kind of weird."

Vlad frowned as he reached up and ran his hands through the now raven locks he had. "I tried to make this form look different for the purpose of not having people easily make the connection between Masters and Plasmius." He smoothed down the horned look of his hair, easily manipulating his form after years of practice as he drew his dark locks into the usual ponytail he styled in his human form. "Better?"

"Plamius? Is that what you go by as a ghost?" Jack questioned curiously.

"Much," Danny answered with a firm nod. "But keep the fangs. They look good."

A rush of heat rose to his cheeks at that small compliment. Vlad fought it back with a cough as he focused his attention onto Jack. "Yes, I chose that name for my ghost form."

When an alarm blared, they all snapped their head toward the door leading down into the laboratory. Jack and Maddie shot to their feet, rushing toward the door. Vlad and Danny reacted half a second later and followed after them.


	19. Chapter 18

Vlad transformed back into his normal human appearance before he followed Danny through the doorway. He didn't trust Pamela farther than he could blast her, or the second hit man for that matter, especially since they were working for the Guys in White. If the hit men were to, somehow, report back to the Guys in White about Vlad being a half ghost, the hit on Jack would be the least of their worries.

When he reached the laboratory, Vlad saw Maddie and Jack had already grabbed ecto blasters and were taking aim at the ghost that came through the Portal that remained open. "Wait!" Vlad shouted before anyone could fire off any type of projectile at the other. The three Fentons turned to Vlad with Maddie and Jack frowning in disappointment at being stopped from capturing another ghost. Still by the Portal door, the ghost folded his arms as his feet touched down upon the floor.

"Playing nice with the enemy now?" The voice came from the ghost containment unit where they kept the captive hit men. Pamela remained at the far end, nestled in the same corner she slept in last night. Her appearance was rather disheveled from a long night in the containment unit. She sat with her legs under her and her hands in her lap. Her eyes were closed, but her brow wrinkled like she was in deep concentration about something. But the one that spoke was the man the crept in through the window last night to kill Jack. He removed his mask, revealing short cropped blond hair and a well groomed mustache. His piercing blue eyes narrowed at them as his nose wrinkled with disgust. His neck had bruising from where Vlad squeezed his throat until the man passed out.

Vlad walked over slowly to the containment unit. "If you think ghosts are the enemy, you are sadly mistaken," he said in a calm, controlled voice as he glared back at the man. "It's true that there are violent, malicious ghosts in the world, but that's only a small percentage of the whole ghost community. You shouldn't think that they all deserve to be attacked and eradicated because of the actions of a few." He hit the button that cut off the intercom before the hit man could muster up an argument in response. A smirk twitched at his mouth in the knowledge that they could speak freely now without the assassins overhearing their conversation.

"So this is another ghost we can't capture?" Jack asked in disappointment.

"Sorry." Vlad turned and frowned at his friends. "This one came by my request."

"When did you even have the chance to contact any ghosts?" Danny asked with a slight creasing of his brow. "With everything that's been happening, you didn't have time to go into the Ghost Zone."

"I had plenty of time last night while you were passed out," Vlad pointed out with a tiny smirk.

"Not if you were doing your job like promised and keeping watch on Dad," Danny returned, folding his arms as he glared in response to the smirk.

Jack blew a sharp whistle that broke up their little staring contest. "Care to explain why you invited a ghost to our house?"

"I would have preferred if you didn't make me come to the house of known ghost hunters," the ghost said grumpily, and it was hard to tell if he glared or not with those dark sunglasses that he wore.

"My apologies, but I'm assuming that your presence here means that you got the information I requested." Vlad hoped the ghost that was a master of technology wouldn't disappoint him by failing to gather the necessary information.

"What information would you ask a ghost to get?" Maddie questioned with her finger still on the trigger as if she was waiting for a sign that the ghost would turn into a violent menace that they would need to fight.

"Information on the Guys in White?" Danny's brow rose as it dawned him why Vlad would enlist the help of a ghost.

"The Guys in White?" Jack and Maddie repeated, both in shock.

"Yeah, we worked it out last night," Danny answered. "The hit men started making attempts on Dad's life after you rejected their offer to buy you out. Since they couldn't stop you from continuing your ghost hunting activities, they decided killing you would be the best way to get you out of the way so they could continue to monopolize the ghost hunting market."

"I knew there was something rotten about those people," Maddie growled through clenched teeth, her hands squeezing around the blaster. Her violet eyes narrowed in a furious look that Vlad was happy wasn't directed at him.

"What information did you find out?" Jack asked, slightly hesitant when addressing the ghost. It would take them some time to get used to the idea of not attacking every ghost they met.

The ghost turned his head toward Jack, and his mouth pressed into a frown. Technus, as Vlad came to know him, spent most of his time in the Ghost Zone, preferring to keep out of the real world and especially away from ghost hunters and for good reason. In the early days of becoming a hit man and learning to use his powers, Vlad rescued Technus from being targeted and tortured by ghost hunters. He had no reason to help other ghosts, but that instant turned out to be beneficial to him when he learned about Technus' mastery of technology. Whenever he needed something done that involved technology, manufacturing a cover, researching on a target beyond the basics that were given to him, Vlad contacted Technus to help him. They developed their own coded language that Vlad could use, sending it thorugh the internet to reach Technus.

Technus cleared his throat before his head turned back to Vlad. "As you probably realized, this isn't the first time the Guys in White have tried to eliminate the competition." He reached his black coat and retrieved a small flash drive that he tossed to Vlad, who caught it with one hand. "That has all the documentation. Newspapers articles about the other ghost hunter groups. Internal reports from the Guys in White. Private records from the heads approving everything and paying out the hit man. They've been quite busy in four years, getting rid of the other ghost hunters. The first ones they took out were the Groovy Gang and Scaredy Cat. They were easily bought out, though the money they got for never ghost hunting again ran out fairly quickly. They weren't exactly wise with their spending, and the contract they signed prevents them from taking up ghost hunting again.

"The Extreme Ghostbreakers weren't as willing to give up their career, but," Technus frowned, "they had 'accidents' that led to their deaths. Nothing was ever proved, and it was easy to write their deaths off as stunts taken too far. They were the type that lived for the thrill, and they were quite reckless when it came to, basically, everything. There is a large number of other groups from all around the world. Some were bought out, some were forced into bankruptcy, and some ended up dead after failing to agree to the Guys' in White terms."

"So now we go after them, right?" Danny demanded, his eyes flashing momentarily green with the rage he felt toward the people that wanted to hurt his family.

Technus turned his head toward Danny for the first time since his arrival. "And I thought there was only one half ghost." An eyebrow lifted curiously as his attention remained on Danny.

"You might want to control that," Vlad said with a side glance toward the young man. "We don't want anyone untrustworthy to take notice of your ghostly abilities."

Danny blinked, some of the tension melting from his shoulders. "It's so weird not being ghost all the time." He stared down a his hands much like last night, like it was difficult to fathom that he was still alive. They could act like everything was back to normal, but there was still an adjustment period that they would all have to make. After living as a ghost for so long, Danny would need to relearn how to do live as a human, though perhaps the fact that he still acted quite human during his time as a ghost would make the process easier on him.

"We'll help you through it," Maddie said gently, smiling as she brushed her fingers through his raven hair. "You're not alone in this. Not anymore."

Danny's gaze darted toward Vlad, his blue eyes holding the older half ghost's gaze for a moment. Vlad almost thought Danny was trying to say that he hadn't been completely alone. Not recently, at least. "I know." Danny smiled back at his mother. "It's just - I keep feeling like this is all a dream. I'm afraid I'm going to wake up and realize I'm still only a ghost, and you-" His mouth snapped shut with sadness growing in his eyes. He didn't need to finish his statement to get the point across. It was obvious that he feared his parents would look at him as just some spectral freak only tolerated at the moment for helping to keep Jack alive. Even though this was all real and not a dream like he feared, Danny wouldn't shake that dreadful thought for some time.

"Oh, Danny!" Maddie pulled her son into a tight embrace, her arms squeezing reassuringly around him, wanting him to know that she was there and this was real and everything would be okay.

"Well, that's touching," Technus muttered with the slightest sneer on his face. "If that's all, I'd prefer to leave before these ghost hunters decide to break this little truce and destroy me molecule by molecule."

"As long as you're not about to go terrorizing the town," Jack said with a narrowing of his eyes as he pointed a finger at the ghost, "then we have no reason to attack you. Spread that around the Ghost Zone. The Fentons, though ghost hunters, will not attack ghosts unless the ghosts attack first." His blue eyes looked toward Vlad then to his son. "Perhaps there's a way for ghosts and humans to coexist peacefully."

Technus' head turned toward Vlad. "You know some strange people, Plasmius."

"But they're good people." Vlad smiled at his friends, and Jack puffed out his chest with a look of pride. "And if he says they'll be more peaceful with the non-violent ghosts, you can trust him on it."

"If you say so." Technus shrugged with skepticism in his expression. "But I doubt the ghost community will be quick to believe that." He turned to face the Portal and walked through it, disappearing into the swirling green.

"It's going to be hard breaking that habit of reaching for an ecto blaster every time a ghost pops up," Jack said, frowning as he walked over to hit the button that closed the yellow and black striped doors to the Portal.

"We'll help," Danny offered, grinning brightly. Maddie remained close to his side, perhaps being a little overbearing as she kept an arm around his shoulders, but after four years, Danny seemed happy to soak up all the mothering he could. "I've gotten to know quite a few ghosts, and I'm sure Vlad has too. We can tell you if a ghost is harmless, although I guess the violent ones will be easy to spot if they're causing destruction and mayhem to the town." He laughed awkwardly as he scratched at a pink cheek with one finger.

Vlad nodded in thought. "Perhaps we could even set up some talks between you and the ghosts to help better your relations."

"Does that make us like mediums?" Danny asked, tilting his head with a slight crease in his brow. "Like bridging the gap between the living and the dead?"

"That does seem like it would make the most sense," Jack said as he placed a hand to his chin. "Since you're both alive but also ghosts, you have the unique ability of understanding the situation from both sides. So it seems logical that you would act as mediators between the real world and the Ghost Zone."

"That does make me a little curious," Maddie said, turning her gaze to her son. "After the accident, you woke up in the Ghost Zone, and you didn't make your first appearance in the real world as Phantom until much later. What did you do during that time? And how did you manage to get back to the real world? You couldn't have come through our Portal because you would have set off the alarm."

"Ah, well," Danny frowned as his thoughts turned back to that time when he first arrived in the Ghost Zone, "it's hard to really determine the passage of time over there. It's not like they have night and day the same way we do. Everything is just the same green, and there are doors all over the place and little floating islands. So I'm not sure how much time passed from when I first woke up to when I arrived at the jungle island." He reached up and scratched at the back of his head. "Anyway, I met the ghost that lived there. It was his lair. Ghosts have lairs," he directed that comment to his parents. "That's not really important though. Anyway, I was new there, so Skulker - that's the ghost who owned the jungle island lair - decided to take me in and train me. I guess you could say that." He laughed awkwardly. "His training involved a lot of treating me like prey to be hunted, but he also taught me some tricks of hiding and sneaking up on others and how to use some various weapons. He said I was a natural, but I owe a lot of that to Mom and Dad." He smiled proudly at his parents. "He helped me get a handle on the basic ghost abilities, and when I told him I wanted to come back to the real world - I just, I really wanted to see you both again, and Jazz, and Tucker and Sam," Danny frowned sadly, "Skulker introduced me to another ghost named Wulf, who could cut open a portal between the worlds. That's how I ended up back in Amity Park." He shrugged when the story was over.

"Hm," Jack murmured thoughtfully, "maybe it's time we try going into the Ghost Zone and doing some exploring of our own. With the two of you there, of course," he added as he pointed to Danny and Vlad. "You can be our guides and it'll help with the ghost relation stuff."

"But first," Maddie said, "we should do something about the Guys in White." She frowned severely as she folded her arms. "I'd like to have this hit on Jack cleared up as quickly as possible."

"So what's the plan of attack?" Danny questioned, looking eager to start planning their strike upon the corporation. "When do we put an end to them?"

"Violence isn't always the answer," Vlad said with a stern stare at the young man. "The Guys in White have a large corporation that's widely spread. Even if we struck at the headquarters here, there would still be more to come in and take their place. And they might use our attack against us to show that Jack and Maddie shouldn't be allowed to continue their work as ghost hunters. Despite property damage on occasion, they've never endangered anyone's lives. We need to strike at the Guys in White in a way that makes _them_ look bad rather than us."

"So we're going to...?" Danny trailed off as he frowned at the older half ghost.

"We're going to offer a deal with them," Vlad suggested as he held up the flash drive in his hand. "They take the hit off Jack and leave Amity Park and never return, or we expose all their insidious business affairs to the public. No corporation can stay standing once the world knows they've been knocking off their competition with methods that include assassinations."

"What about all the other ghost hunters that they threaten and kill for the sake of their monopoly?" Danny frowned.

"We can't really stop them from continuing with their business practice," Maddie said, her hands tightening around her biceps as an aura of anger seemed to radiate from her. "Though we could use the information that ghost gathered to hold over their heads. Blackmail can be quite persuasive." She smirked deviously.

Vlad turned his gaze to the ghost containment unit to stare at Pamela. He wondered if there was some way to convince her to stand witness against the Guys in White to help their case. It would go a long way to have one of the other hit men state that they were indeed hired by the Guys in White to kill Jack. Vlad could say the same, but if he was going to go in with the Fentons to make the deal with the Guys in White, then he didn't want the corporation knowing his identity. He wanted to put his life as a hit man behind him. Now that he had a life with friends that he cared about.


	20. Chapter 19

Vlad and Maddie sat at the table in the kitchen with a mug in front of each of them. Vlad lost count of how many cups of coffee they drank by that point. Papers were scattered over the table, marked by highlighters in certain places where the information seemed particularly helpful to their case, and increasingly damaging to the Guys in White. After Technus left, Vlad plugged the flash drive into the computer in the laboratory and printed out every file of documentation that the drive contained. Before they could mount their case against the Guys in White to persuade them into accepting their offer, they needed to know the exact details mentioned in the documents.

"Well, this is interesting," Maddie said dryly as her violet eyes scanned over the papers in her hands. "That incident that made their name famous was a little publicity stunt of theirs. They had that ghost captive and released it right where a news story was being taped and had their people on scene to capture the ghost, gaining a good image in the public eye. They have numerous accounts of sending ghosts from one headquarter to another then releasing it, with a limiter to keep their powers controlled, in a place of high traffic in a town so that their people can recapture it. They use ghosts from other towns and shuffle them around so that it doesn't look like, to that particular town, that they're capturing the same ghost each time. They do this whenever true ghost activity is at a low to remind the public that ghosts are a threat and that only they can protect the town from the nasty, evil ghosts bent on destruction." She frowned, a sickened expression twisting upon her face.

"I wouldn't be surprised if they tormented the ghosts to arouse a violent response from them," Vlad said, though his voice was calm, he felt sickened to hear that news too. "Imagine now, if the Guys in White had captured Cujo." He closed his eyes as a shudder ran down his spine at the thought of the terrible things they could do to the puppy. "Sweet, innocent Cujo who only wanted to play fetch like any puppy. It would be the same as those owners that abuse their dogs, turning them into vicious creatures, for those dog fights."

Maddie swallowed thickly as she laid the papers before her on the table. She looked quite shaken as what Vlad said danced in her head. "Vlad, I know we always had that dream of capturing ghosts and studying them to better understand them. But this," she spread her arm over the table, gesturing to all the papers, "I never want us to turn into this type of ghost hunter."

Vlad reached across the table and took her hand, giving it a small, comforting squeeze. "You could never be like them," he told her seriously but in a gentle voice. "Your passion for ghosts is to learn more about them, not use and abuse them as a money making scheme. And now that you've learn about me, about Danny, you can start learning about ghosts in a different way. You've already studied some things about Danny, though that data is bound to have quite a few anomalies considering he isn't full ghost like you thought. But there's still a lot you can learn from what you gathered from him. If you assure the ghosts that you aren't going to destroy them, I bet we can find a few that would be willing to allow you to study them once we've developed some good relations between you and them."

"You're so sweet, Vlad." Maddie smiled and squeezed his hand.

Danny groaned as he walked into the kitchen, rubbing at his raven hair with a thick, fluffy towel. "I forgot how tiring a human body could be," he said as he sat down, wearing only a towel, which shouldn't be that surprising Vlad realized since none of his old clothes would fit him.

Vlad struggled to keep his attention on the papers he was reading, but his gaze kept straying to Danny sitting beside him. The stab wound remained visible, and though it would leave a scar, it was healing nicely. A memory of an act of selflessness to save his father. A memento that Danny could wear proudly. But it wasn't the only scar on his body. Thin pink lines spider webbed over pale flesh, and Vlad now understood why the young man possessed such scars. They were leftover from having the surge of electricity coursing through his body after the Portal activated while he was still inside it. When he thought about it, Vlad realized sadly that he got off easy with a small blast to the face and a case of ecto acne. As much pain as he felt during that incident, it was a pin prick compared to the electrocution that Danny survived.

"But a hot shower?" Danny sighed as he leaned his head back over the back of the chair. "Man, that felt really good."

Jack entered the kitchen, wiping the sweat from his face with a towel. While Vlad and Maddie went over the paperwork, Jack took Danny off for a short workout session, starting off slowly as Danny got used to his human body again. "It occurs to me," he said as he walked over to the cupboard to grab a glass then poured himself some water. Maddie didn't bother to hide it as she watched her husband with a smile. After a nice, long gulp, he continued, "we need to get some clothes for Danny. Nothing we have fits him, but taking him into town would involve questions coming up from anyone that we meet."

"I know," Danny's blue eyes landed on Vlad, "that you suggested I stay human for a while, but I could always go ghost and make the trip to a clothing store invisibly with Mom and Dad."

"Let's leave that as an idea," Maddie said, getting up when she heard the doorbell ring, "but that might bring up questions too." She left the kitchen, and Jack followed after setting down the glass on the counter.

"This is a lot of stuff to look through," Danny mumbled as he leaned on the table, poking at some of the papers. "I'm glad you're the one going through it and no t me." He chuckled, glancing at Vlad before he bit his lower lip and dropped his gaze. "The whole research thing wasn't anything I was good at." The corners of his mouth tugged upward, but the attempt to smile failed. "When this is all over, what do I do? I've been so focused on keeping Dad safe, that I didn't think about the afterward."

"You thought you were up against a hopelessly endless stream of hit men," Vlad reminded, and he reached over to nudge the man's arm with an elbow. "Weren't you the one that told me it wasn't too late?" The question managed to produce a small smile from Danny. "You're only eighteen. You still have a _long_ life ahead of you. You have plenty of time to go back to school and find a career that you'll love. And if you need help staying focused on your studies instead of getting lost in the stars," Vlad sat back in his chair and pointed a thumb at his chest, "I can help."

"Thanks." Danny smiled as he glanced up from under those long lashes with an almost shy expression. Vlad ignored that flutter inside him when the young half ghost looked at him like that. He shouldn't have that sort of reaction to someone so young, but it was hard to deny that he grew some attachment to Danny during their time together.

"Sam!" The outburst made both men still seated at the kitchen table spin around in their chairs to stare at the doorway to the front hall.

"No!" the young woman shouted in response, her heavy boots thumping upon the floor as she grew closer to the kitchen. Vlad glanced at Danny, who looked seconds away from turning ghost and disappearing before the woman could reach the kitchen. Naturally, the young man would feel some nervousness about his friends seeing him again after thinking him dead for four years. "Everyone said they saw my mom come here," Sam continued shouting. "We searched all around, but everything lead back here. I know she can be overbearing and controlling, but she's still my mom. Now someone better start telling me what happened to," Sam slowed to a stop when she entered the kitchen, "her." Her eyes grew wide as her mouth hung open.

"Sam, you can't think-" the young man with the beret argued as he entered the kitchen with Danny's parents. He wore the same shocked expression the moment his green eyes landed on Danny, sitting nervously at the kitchen table.

"Danny?" both of them exclaimed, gasping like they had the air forced out of them.

"H-Hey, guys," Danny greeted, forcing a smile onto his face as he tried to act like there was nothing strange about meeting his friends. He stood from the chair then hesitated with uncertainty. His blue eyes remained on his friends, absorbing that disbelief in their expression. His hand made a small attempt to reach for Vlad, but his fingers curled tightly and his arm dropped back to his side.

"We have an explanation for this," Jack said, though they still hadn't even touched the topic of how exactly to explain Danny's presence to the public.

Then the shock shattered. "Danny!" his friends shouted with much more emotion in their voices as they rushed forward and latched onto him, clinging to him as if they never wanted to let him go again for fear that they would lose him for a second time. Danny chuckled as he returned their hugs, his long, lanky arms circling around the pair.

"We thought-" Sam started.

"But then we saw-" Tucker rambled.

"But we didn't think-" They couldn't seem to get their sentences finished as tears gathered in their eyes and thick emotions choked off their words.

Tucker was the one to pull away first, taking a deep breath to recollect himself. "We thought that incident with the Portal _killed_ you, Danny!" His eyes bugged out behind his glasses. "Then we saw Phantom show up, and we couldn't believe it."

"He just looked so much like you that we thought maybe it _was_ you," Sam said as she stepped back from Danny, whose mouth hung open with surprise in his blue eyes. "But then it seemed like he never recognized us so we thought-" Her eyes turned sad as she dropped her gaze to her hands, twisting the hem of her black shirt.

"We thought maybe you forgot us, or your life as Danny," Tucker explained, hurt showing in his eyes.

Danny's eyelids fluttered for a moment as he took in that information. "Wait," he breathed out, having to place his hand on the back of Vlad's chair to steady himself. "So you _knew_ that I was Phantom?"

"We hoped," Sam said, offering a tiny smile. "We wanted to believe, even if it wasn't true, because if you were Phantom, then at least it meant that you were still around. Even if you didn't remember us, even if we never talked, it helped to think that you still existed in some form."

Danny's hand tightened around the back of the chair, and he looked like he really needed to sit after hearing that. "I thought-" He reached up and scratched a hand through his hair. "It never seemed like you recognized me." He lowered his gaze. "I thought you didn't know it was me. I didn't want to approach you because I didn't want to hurt you." He lifted his head and looked between his friends. "I can't believe you knew I was Phantom."

"How _are_ you Phantom?" Tucker questioned, boggling at the fact as he stared at his friend.

"Well, the short story is that the Portal incident gave me ghost powers." Danny shrugged, a small roll of his shoulders. "I thought I was really dead until just last night. So human body," he looked down at himself but didn't show any signs of being ashamed of standing there half naked, "kind of still getting used to it."

"You two have to promise to keep this secret," Maddie said, using her serious mother tone as she glared at the pair of teenagers.

"Mom, you know you can trust them," Danny said with a slight groan in his voice.

"I know." Maddie sighed, exhaustion showing in her expression. "But we can't let it get out that you're half ghost. We still need to figure out how to explain where you've been these last four years."

"And get you clothes," Jack added.

Tucker placed a hand to his chin as he looked his friend over. "I could probably pick some stuff up for you. You're thinner than I am, but we're still roughly the same height."

Maddie walked over to the counter where her purse sat. "Stay away from the high end clothing," she said as she gave the young man a sharp eyed look. "I'm giving you the money so you can buy clothes at a reasonable price. Danny doesn't need some silly looking track suit that costs a hundred dollars. He needs more than one outfit." She dug out some bills from her wallet, but she hesitated, perhaps worrying that Tucker would spend the money on something other than clothing for her son.

"I'll be back before you know it," Tucker announced once Maddie handed over the money. With a wave, he left the kitchen, heading for the front door.

"Mom, you can relax," Danny said. "It's not like he's going to use the money-" A thought occurred to him, and he glanced toward Sam. "Maybe you should go with him and make sure no new tech distracts him."

Sam's mouth thinned, her lips painted violet to match her eyes, as she turned toward Danny's parents. "I still have questions though." Her gaze was hard and determined. She wouldn't be dropping the topic of her missing mother until she got some answers. "My mom _did_ come here yesterday. Your neighbors _saw_ her enter your house. You _lied_ to me last night. Why? What are you hiding? What happened to my mom?"

"Sam, you have to understand-" Maddie said, frowning as her brow creased with concern.

"Perhaps it's best to just tell her," Vlad suggested.

"Okay. Who's the old guy?" Sam asked Danny as she pointed at Vlad.

"I'm not _that_ old," Vlad grumbled, feeling like his feathers were ruffled with that comment. "My name is Vlad Masters. I'm a friend of the family," he explained in a much smoother tone. "And since you're going to keep searching for answers no matter what we tell you, it's better if we just tell you everything right now." Maddie and Jack exchanged hesitant glances.

"We might as well," Danny agreed, though he frowned. "She deserves to know the truth."

"You're starting to make me really nervous." Sam shifted her weight uncomfortably.

"Your mother," Maddie started, glancing at her husband, "did come to see us yesterday." With a frown, she turned her gaze back onto Sam. "She came over with the intention of trying to kill Jack."

"What?" Sam gasped, shock widening her eyes as she stumbled back a step. "I know my mom isn't very fond of you and she drives me crazy. But she would never try to kill you!"

"Sam," Danny said gently as he placed a hand on her shoulder, "I know how crazy it sounds. But this," he pointed at the stab wound on his chest, "this right here is from when I jumped in the way to stop the knife your mother threw at my dad. Your mom's a hit man hired by the Guys in White."

"I can understand the Guys in White thing." Sam's brow furrowed as her violet gaze drifted around the room. "But my _mom_? A hit man? I can't believe that." She shook her head, rejecting the truth told to her.

"Perhaps," Vlad said as he stood, "you can convince her to turn away from that life." He walked over to the door to the laboratory. "We're keeping her locked up, but if you can get her to promise to stop pursuing the hit on Jack's life, we'd be willing to let her go."

Sam stared at the open doorway, fear of the truth making her hesitant. Then, tilting her head up, she strode toward the door with confidence in her step, perhaps thinking to prove them wrong about her mother. Vlad hoped, for her sake, that the young woman would be able to accept the truth.


	21. Chapter 20

It was a tense silence. Almost. The blond man stood at the glass wall, shouting out the indignity of keeping an innocent man captive and that once he was released, he would inform everyone of their unlawful holding of a man who had done them no wrong. He could rant until he was blue in the face, attempting to appeal to Sam in hopes that she would hit the release button that would allow him to escape, but no one was paying even the slightest bit of attention to anything that he said. His angry words were barely a hum in the background as they all kept their eyes upon mother and daughter. For the longest time, the two of them didn't speak as their eyes stared into each other. At her sides, Sam's hands clenched tightly, and her mouth thinned, her jaw setting.

"So it's true," Sam said, breaking the silence after what felt like an eternity. Disbelief flashed briefly in her violet eyes before they turned hard, firm, determined not to break. "You tried to kill Danny's dad."

Pamela reached up, running her hands through auburn hair in an attempt to smooth down the locks into some semblance of order. "It was a job," she stated simply as if there was nothing more to say on the topic beyond that.

"Why?" Sam shouted, anger in her voice and flashing in her eyes. She stood right before the glass wall and slammed her hands against it. Her eyes narrowed, but hurt shone through the anger. "Why would you accept a job to kill Danny's dad?" Her fingers curled, nails scratching over glass. "Have you been a hit man this whole time? Have you been lying to Dad? Have you been lying to _me_ all this time?"

She remained calm and collected when Vlad spoke to her, but faced with her daughter, Pamela's mask showed cracks. The corners of her mouth pulled down, and her aqua colored eyes turned away, unable to meet her daughter's gaze. "It was an accident."

"What?" Sam screamed outraged. No mattered their relationship before, Sam still believed that they shared that same familial love that other parents shared with their children. Vlad could only imagine from that hurt and betrayal upon her face, that the thought that her mother never loved her cut Sam more painfully than any knife ever could. She couldn't deny it when her mother stated it so plainly, even if she wanted to continue believing her mother loved her.

Pamela waited, but when Sam didn't continue ranting, she spoke again. "When Jeremy and I met, it was one of those whirl wind romances. He was the young heir to a fortune, and I was as assassin sent to kill his uncle. I'd already built up a fair fortune myself, so his money wasn't as big an appeal to me as it might be for other young women. I dressed up and attended an event where his uncle was sure to make an appearance. But I ran into Jeremy first, and we danced, and it was exciting. We met several times afterwards, and the assignment slipped my mind, until another hit man came in and got the job done. With his uncle dead, I had little reason to continue hanging around. Later, I discovered I was pregnant. That wasn't in my plan. I couldn't continue as a hit man with a baby on the way." She frowned as she stared at Sam. "I could have given you up, gotten an abortion, and continued on with my life. But," she hesitated, the words sticking in her throat, "I decided to keep you. I might not have gotten the chance to have a child again, to love and be loved in return, so I returned to Jeremy and gave up my life as a hit man. You were a mistake, but not one I could ever regret making. I have never regretted my life with Jeremy and with you." A smile tentatively stretched over her face, a scared smile of a mother fearing rejection of her child.

"Then why-" Sam's voice trembled as she shook her head. She snapped her gaze back up to her mother and slammed a fist hard against the glass. "Why would you risk throwing it all away to kill Jack?" She stared searchingly at her mother, but she couldn't find the answers on her own.

"I suppose you're looking for more than the Fentons drive me insane." Pamela snapped annoyed eyes to Jack and Maddie. She took a breath and released it slowly as she turned back to her daughter. "The Guys in White knew me. I don't know how they got the information, but they lorded over me saying they would ruin me if I didn't do as they wished. I didn't want to lose you and Jeremy, and I didn't want to cause problems for Jeremy if my past got out."

"So you made it look like you were at least putting in the effort without really trying to kill Jack?" Vlad asked, frowning at the woman.

Pamela turned her gaze on him as she returned the frown. "I knew there was a high possibility that the poison in the fudge could kill him, but it was a slow working poison. If you acted quickly enough, I knew he could make it to the hospital and be saved. The fact that you and the ghost bodyguard figured it out and stood guard all night over Jack made it easier for me to have an excuse for not attacking him in the hospital."

"And you tried to appeal to me to kill Jack so that the job would be over and you could return to your family having not killed Jack yourself."

"Yes," Pamela agreed with Vlad, "that was the idea. But I see you're too loyal a friend to kill him."

"You were going to kill your friend?" Sam gazed at Vlad with surprise.

"Things happened and I did stuff I'm not proud of." Vlad shrugged it off like it was no big deal. "But we've moved past it, and I've gotten over what drove me to that dark place that made me actually want to kill Jack."

"Perhaps we should keep her locked up still," Maddie said thoughtfully as she held a gloved hand to her chin, her mouth pressing thin.

"Excuse me?" Sam shouted, placing her hands on her hips as she glared at her friend's mother. "My mom is a person, and even if she's a hit man, that doesn't give you the right to lock her up like some poor creature in a zoo."

"No, she's right," Pamela said, and her agreement shocked her daughter and the Fentons. "If I'm released now, the Guys in White will try again to force me into killing Jack. As long as I remained confined, I have the excuse of not being able to complete my assignment."

"You have _got_ to be kidding me with this," the blond hit man said, disgust in his expression as he stared at the woman locked up with him.

Pamela turned cold, steely eyes upon him. "I may have been out of the assassin game for the last eighteen years, but I can still take down a stupid punk like you in half a second flat."

"Oh, I definitely wouldn't get on her bad side, if I were you," Sam said with a smug smirk as she folded her arms. "Mom and I might not agree on a lot of things, but she always believed that a woman should know how to defend herself. You'll be sorry if you try fighting her."

"Maddie's no slouch when it comes to fighting either," Pamela said with a tiny smirk.

"Perhaps later, we can have a real spar sometime," Maddie suggested, looking eager for another match against the woman.

"Um," Sam started, biting her lower lip, "is it okay if I have some time alone with my mom? This is a lot to take in, and I want to ask her some more stuff."

"Of course," Maddie said with a smile as she directed Jack toward the stairs.

"I guess it's back to working through all those documents," Vlad said tiredly as he rubbed at a shoulder, following his friends out of the laboratory. They wanted to have every detail of the Guys' in White activities memorized before they went to their headquarters to mount their case against the corporation.

"I can take over for a while," Jack offered as he patted Vlad on the back. "You were up all night keeping watch. You should get some rest."

Vlad opened his mouth, prepared to put up an argument against his friend, but it died in his throat. Jack was right. Even with all the coffee that he drank earlier while wading through the documents, exhaustion kept pulling at him. "I'll just be laying down in the front room then." He left Jack and Maddie to the paperwork as he strode from the kitchen to the front room.

"Dude, seriously?" Tucker exclaimed , gaping at Danny as Vlad entered.

When his friend returned, Danny disappeared with the other young man to put on whatever clothes his friend bought him. Danny now sat on the couch dressed in loose fitted jeans and a white shirt that looked big on his narrow frame. Once he started putting on muscle and weight, the shirt and jeans would fit better.

Danny rubbed at the back of his neck. "Trust me. I really want to, you have _no idea_ , but I can't." Vlad's brow wrinkled, wondering to what they were referring.

"But it's Nasty Burger!" Tucker exclaimed, dangling the white bag in front of his friend. "How can you say no to that?"

"Yeah, it's been _four years_ ," Danny returned, staring hungrily at the bag before him. "You have no idea how much I've missed getting Nasty Burgers with you and Sam like always. But I have to be careful about how much I eat for a while. Just until my body's back to the usual rhythm of living again."

"I think half a burger would be all right," Vlad said as he walked over to join Danny on the couch. "It's been a while since breakfast, and we haven't even had lunch yet."

Danny's blue eyes grew wide, like Vlad just announced they would be having Christmas early this year. Then he grabbed at the bag in Tucker's hand and tore it open. "Oh, sweet, Nasty Burger, how I've longed for you," he whispered as he stared into the bag.

"It's hard to imagine that anything called Nasty Burger could be good," Vlad said with a slight wrinkling of his nose.

"Nasty Burger has always been the Amity Park hang out for teenagers," Tucker explained as he pulled out a burger from his own bag. "I thought Danny would like the treat."

"You're the best!" Danny grinned as he ripped his burger in half. He stared down at the two halves, one slightly smaller than the other. Then he held out the larger of the two for Vlad to take. "You must be hungry too."

Vlad eyed the burger with great hesitancy, but he couldn't deny that other than being tired, he was also hungry. He took the larger half, handling it with some delicacy as drips of the sauce dangled from it. With a chuckle, Danny pulled out some napkins and laid them over Vlad's lap before the sauce could drop and stain his pants. Vlad sent him a thankful look before he lifted the burger to his mouth. Despite the name, the burger was actually fairly tasty.

"I've missed this so much," Danny mumbled through a mouthful of food.

"So," Tucker said, licking off a trickle of a sauce from his thumb, "what do you plan to do about school?"

"Well," Danny swallowed his food, "as much as I've missed being harassed by Dash these last four years, I think going for a GED would be a good option. Then maybe I can get into college at the same time as you and Sam. Even if I'm a year behind or something, at least I won't have to be stuck as a freshman at eighteen. That idea just feels really depressing."

"Dude, I can totally understand." Tucker patted him on the shoulder while Vlad frowned, having failed to think of that point when it came to Danny's education. The young man, of course, would want to avoid being mocked for having to go through high school being four years older than his classmates. "But I think you should go see Dash some time."

"Right," Danny laughed as he nodded his head. "Because _that_ will go so well."

"I'm serious!" Tucker's expression showed no sign of joking. "Your death didn't just affect us and your family. When your parents finally officially declared you were dead, it hit a lot of people pretty hard. Even Lancer looked pretty miserable after that."

"Lancer? Seriously?" Danny gawked at his friend. When his friend nodded, Danny looked dazed for a moment. "I thought it was great when he stood up for my parents at the school, but I didn't think he really cared about me that much."

"Lancer surprisingly cares about all his students. It's a shame you missed out on these last four years." Tucker stared down at his half eaten burger. "He was pretty helpful, offering advice to everyone that was mourning over your death."

Danny took another small bite of his burger, chewing it while he chewed over his thoughts. "I guess we really need to start thinking about how to explain my miraculous revival."

"Oh!" Tucker sat up straighter as an idea struck him. "Say the Guys in White kidnapped you! Yeah, they took you after your parents rejected their offer because they thought it would make your parents give up ghost hunting, and you only now managed to get away from them."

Danny frowned at the suggestion then shook his head. "There would be no evidence to support that claim. If we go after them with blackmail, it should be with the truth and what we have hard evidence to support."

"It was a nice thought though," Vlad offered, seeing Tucker deflate from what he thought was an ingenious suggestion. "After reading about some of the things that they've done in the past, kidnapping to force their competitors to bend to their will doesn't sound like a farfetched idea." He finished off his half of the burger and wiped his hands clean on the napkins in his lap.

"Oh!" Danny's eyes widened. "I ran away." He still had a few bites left to his half of the burger, but he didn't seem interested in finishing it. "I could say I ran away. Maybe we could get one of the ghosts to play along and say they found me while I was walking around alone and kidnapped me. And since my parents couldn't find evidence of what happened to me, and I wasn't being held for ransom, their only option was to claim that I was dead. But only just recently I managed to escape from my captor and managed to make it back home."

"That sounds like it could be plausible," Vlad murmured in thought.

"I helped," Tucker put in with a proud grin that his suggestion of kidnapping kicked off a possible explanation for what happened to Danny.


	22. Chapter 21

The next morning, Vlad woke as usual in the bed in Danny's bedroom. After dinner last night and they finished putting all their paperwork together to present to the Guys in White, Maddie insisted that Vlad should get some sleep that night, instead of being on patrol like the previous night. They would be heading to the Guys' in White headquarters to make their proposed offer, and it would be wise for them to be well rested. Jack would, of course, remain at home where he wouldn't be walking right into the arms of the enemy, and Danny would stay with him in case any other hit men stopped by to finish the job.

Tucker and Sam stayed for dinner, the young woman looking like a great weight was lifted from her after her conversation with her mother. The last Vlad saw of Danny before retiring to bed, the young half ghost was curled up on the couch with his friends as they watched television in the front room. Vlad was, and he wished he could deny it, jealous to see Sam and Tucker leaning against Danny, who sat between them, but it was good for Danny to reconnect with his friends.

His attention shifted away from the events of last night as his groggy morning mind picked up on an oddity. Perhaps not quite as strange as it might have seemed weeks ago. They had shared a bed prior to last night, but during those previous nights, Vlad didn't wake to find a weight upon him. Dark blue eyes cracked open, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the morning light. He lifted his head slightly from the pillow as he stared down at Danny, who was pressed comfortably against his side with his head resting upon Vlad's chest and an arm wrapped securely about the older half ghost's body. It shouldn't be strange that Danny would return to his own room to sleep in his own bed, but Vlad couldn't deny a little nervousness at seeing the young man dressed in only a pair of boxers. Swallowing, he wondered if there was any way he could manage to slip free, though part of him really didn't wish to, without the young half ghost noticing.

"Where you going?" Danny mumbled when Vlad shifted under him. He dragged himself up to sit back on his legs, allowing Vlad to sit up too. His mouth opened wide in a yawn as he stretched his arms over his head, his back arching with the action. When his arms dropped down, he leaned back on them as he landed bright blue eyes upon the older half ghost. "It's still pretty early." He tilted his head to one side as he lifted a curious eyebrow.

"I thought it would be good to get an early start on the day," Vlad answered as he climbed off the bed. If he recognized it as a lie, Danny didn't call him out on it. While his mind revolved around the missed opportunity with Maddie for several years, Vlad hadn't thought about anyone else, and certainly never in an intimate situation. Sharing a bed might seem like a small thing, and it hadn't bothered him previously, but it was different today. He knew Danny was still alive, and Danny was the son of his best friends and only eighteen. He really shouldn't be having any thoughts toward the young man. "I was thinking, perhaps, after breakfast, we could do a little training."

Danny sat up straighter, looking more awake. "Really?" The excitement on his face at the mention of training gained a chuckle from the older half ghost, and Danny ducked his head with a light blush upon his cheeks.

"But of course. Did you think I wouldn't?" Vlad stared at the young man curiously as Danny sat with his legs hanging over the edge of the bed and picking absently at the folds of the blanket tucked under his legs. Vlad watched the small roll of pale shoulders as Danny kept his head bowed. "Well, there are quite a few things that I can teach you, and once you're dressed and we've had our breakfast, we can get started on it."

Vlad left the bedroom to allow Danny to dress as he headed down the hall to the bathroom for his usual morning routine. After he dressed and washed up, he walked downstairs and to the kitchen. Maddie sat at the table as she sipped from a mug of coffee. Two stacks of a papers sat before her: every piece of evidence regarding the illegal activities of the Guys in White in their rise to power as a ghost hunting corporation.

"How long have you been up?" Vlad questioned as he walked over to the refrigerator and looked through it to find something to make for breakfast.

"A few hours," Maddie answered, exhaustion seeping into her voice as she set the mug down on the table. "I couldn't sleep with this," her hand landed on one of the stacks of papers, "hanging over me." A tired sigh escaped her. "But at least it should all be over with today. We can finally go back to our old lives without the harassment of the Guys in White or looking over our shoulders for assassins."

"And you have your son back," Vlad reminded and caught a smile tugging across Maddie's face.

"If nothing else, I'm at least happy that Danny is with us again." Maddie's smile faltered, and she shook her head. "I mean, that we know it's him, and-"

"It's okay, Maddie," Vlad told her in a gentle voice. "It hurt you to think that Danny was gone, and it probably would have hurt more to see Danny as something that you considered evil until recently."

Her violet eyes were sad, watching Vlad in silence for a moment as he prepared breakfast. "Maybe if we had stopped to see that not all ghosts were evil, Danny would have felt more comfortable confiding in us before now."

"We can play the what if game for an eternity, Maddie, but it won't change the past." Vlad glanced over his shoulder as he frowned at her. "Instead, let's focus on what we have now. Danny is alive, and you have the chance to reconnect with him. I've gotten over my anger and stupidity, and we can be friends again." A smile slipped easily onto his face, and Maddie slowly returned it. "We might have regrets about the past, but that shouldn't lessen our happiness for what we have now."

"Mm," Danny moaned as he entered the kitchen, fully dressed, and breathed in the scent of food cooking, "pancakes." He wandered over to where Vlad stood at the stove, waiting for the pancakes in the pan to turn golden before flipping them over to cook the other side. "Please tell me I'm allowed more than half of one." He stared pleadingly at Vlad, pressing just a touch too closely to the older man.

"Yes, yes," Vlad said and waved his spatula at Danny to shoo him away. "Now go get a glass of milk. Your body needs the calcium."

Danny rolled his eyes but left Vlad's side to walk over to the refrigerator to grab the milk. He greeted his father when Jack entered the kitchen. Jack ruffled Danny's raven hair before walking over to his wife and kissing her on the cheeks. The pair of them picked up the papers and moved them aside so that they would be out of the way and wouldn't get ruined while they ate breakfast. When he finished, Vlad carried over a large plate stacked with pancakes and set it in the center of the table. Danny practically drooled in anticipation of eating them.

"I thought I would give Danny a little training this morning," Vlad announced while they ate. "But I don't think it would be wise to use the laboratory with that one hit man down there." They might be able to convince Pamela to keep the secret of them being half ghosts, though Vlad felt it safer to leave her in the dark. The blond man, however, couldn't be trusted even the slightest bit to keep silent about their secret.

"You can use the Emergency Ops Center," Jack suggested around a mouthful of pancakes. "You can put down the shields, and that will keep anyone from being able to see inside it. Not that anyone would really be peering into it, since it's on the roof, but it's better to be safe than sorry about this kind of thing."

Maddie piled some of the pancakes onto a new plate and grabbed some fresh silverware. Since yesterday after the talk between Pamela and Sam, Maddie became more friendly toward the other woman, bringing her food at meal times. Though Pamela had no care for Maddie's interest in ghosts, it seemed their interest in sparring sparked a mutual respect between them. Pamela kept the blond man pinned down whenever Maddie opened the door to the ghost containment unit to drop off the plate of food for the woman. Silverware was a dangerous tool to leave in the hands of a hit man, but Pamela had no intention of trying to escape, and she would sooner stab the other assassin with either fork or knife than allow him to steal them from her.

When they were finished, Vlad and Danny climbed up to the Emergency Ops Center perched in what some might consider a precarious position upon the roof of the house. Jack volunteered to do the clean up after everyone finished with breakfast. Vlad looked over the command center for the button that would activate the shields, but Danny pressed it first, grinning at him from the other end of the console as the shields slid down to cover the windows. Vlad folded his arms as he leaned against the console.

"Well, I don't need to teach you about hand-to-hand fighting," Vlad said, thinking of where to begin with teaching Danny about his powers. "Your parents and that Skulker ghost seem to have done well there."

"And I've got the basics down," Danny reminded as he stretched.

When he bent one arm behind his head to grab the other arm at the elbow and leaned to one side, his black shirt lifted to show off a thin strip of pale flesh, looking far paler in contrast to the dark color of the shirt. Vlad kept his gaze up, despite temptation to stare at what was shown to him. White rings appeared, and in a moment, Danny stood there as Phantom, his body looking fuller in the absence of that stretched out appearance his human form had.

"So I've got flight," he floated in the air. "Invisibility," he blinked out briefly from sight and reappeared before Vlad. "Intangibility," with a grin, he passed his hand through Vlad's torso. "Shields," he brought up a green shield around him. "And energy balls," he held out a hand as the energy gathered there to form a ball in his palm. Closing his fist, he extinguished the energy, wisps of green passing through his fingers before they dissipated. "What else can you teach me?" He stared at Vlad, curious to know what else his powers could do.

Vlad pondered what to teach Danny first. Duplication took him quite some time to master, and he thought perhaps they should start with something a little less complicated. "There's a lot you can do with energy alone," he said, transforming into his ghost form. He blinked when Danny grinned widely at him. "What?"

"You kept the hair."

A flush rose to his cheeks as Vlad absently brushed his fingers through the dark locks that remained smoothed down into a ponytail from the last time he went ghost. "Well, since you thought my last style looked hilarious."

Danny bit down on his lower lip, like he was struggling not to laugh. "It was pretty weird looking."

Vlad flushed darker, but with a cough, he steered the conversation back on topic. "As I was saying, your energy can be used to make normal energy balls." He held up a hand and created a ball of pink energy. "But with a little manipulation, you can shape that energy into other forms. Something like," a smirk twisted upon his face as he saw Danny watching with eager curiousness, "this." He twisted his wrist so that his palm faced Danny, and a rope shot from his hand. Danny jumped back but didn't react fast enough to avoid having the rope wrap around him, binding his arms to his sides. A smirk appeared upon his face as Vlad watched the young half ghost struggle for a moment against the rope.

Then Danny stilled and stared calmly at Vlad. "So manipulation, huh?" He dropped his gaze to the rope with a ponderous look. "Mostly just thinking and giving form to my energy right? Kind of like how I twisted it to show the constellations?" His brow creased with concentration, and a glow appeared about his arms. Blades formed along the length of his arms, and then they swung downward, neatly slicing through the rows of rope surrounding Danny. The pink energy faded out of sight in wisps as Danny gripped a pair of glowing green blades in his hands. "Now _that_ is pretty cool!" He grinned at the swords then lifted his head to stare at Vlad.

"There's an infinite number of things you can do with your energy," Vlad said, smiling proudly at how quickly Danny managed to form his energy into something useful. "You're pretty much limited to your imagination. As a half ghost, you have a wider range to your abilities because you aren't limited by your obsessions. Full ghosts' powers revolve around whatever their obsessions are. Like Technus being obsessed with electronics."

"And Skulker being obsessed with hunting," Danny nodded in understanding. "I do know a thing or two about ghosts. You know, my parents being ghost hunters and all."

"Okay," Vlad said as he folded his arms. "Then show me what you can do." He smirked, waiting and watching carefully for what the young half ghost would do.

Danny considered for a moment. Then he raised an arm toward Vlad. The green ropes sprung out much like Vlad had done. They wrapped around Vlad, binding him tightly but not painfully.

Vlad lifted an eyebrow. "I expected something more than simply copying what I did."

A devious smirk spread over Danny's face as he tugged on the ropes, dragging Vlad forward the few feet to close the distance between them. "Maybe I just wanted to be sure you couldn't escape."

Before Vlad could question the comment, Danny leaned forward and caught the man's mouth with his own. Feeling the ropes fade away, he knew he should push the young half ghost away, but Vlad reached up, cupping his hands over the man's cheeks. His hands slipped down, trailing over Danny's jaw as their mouths moved against each other. Hands found their way to his hips, and with a small jerk, he was tugged forward to stand flushed against the other man. He shouldn't want this, should try to stop it, but the warmth spreading from Danny into him and reaching into his chest to fill an emptiness that ached painfully now that he stopped to understand it kept him from disrupting the moment. When their mouths broke apart and their foreheads pressed together, breaths washing over the other's face, Vlad wanted to dive back in for another kiss.

"You shouldn't," Vlad whispered quietly, almost scared of shattering everything to send himself spiraling back into that dark place that he finally managed to leave.

"I shouldn't what?" Danny demanded, his soft gaze turning hard as his mouth pressed into a thin line. "I shouldn't care about you?"

"I'm literally old enough to be your father," Vlad said seriously, but that look in Danny's blue eyes hurt him. He didn't want Danny to look at him with such anger. "You're eighteen, and you have a long life ahead of you. I don't want you to get caught up with me, and then months later, or years later, regret it."

"I'm not." Danny's hands tightened upon his hips as his brow creased. "I know this may just seem like some hormonal teenage thing. And okay, yeah. I _have_ thought about sex with you. But that's not all I think about when it comes to you." He frowned with a look in his eyes that made Vlad's chest squeeze. "You saw me. Before you _knew_ that I was still alive. Before you knew who I was. You saw me, like I was still a person, like I still mattered. You didn't look at me and just see another-" he paused and searched for the right words, "another manifestation of post-human consciousness."

"You sound like you mother when you say that." A tentative smirk twitched at Vlad's mouth.

Danny rolled his eyes with a small smile. "Well, yeah. I've only listened to that sort of talk about ghosts since birth." The frown returned as he dropped his gaze. "That meant a lot to me. You gave me a shoulder to lean on." He sighed softly as he stepped back from Vlad. "I must look really pathetic to you after everything." His arms wrapped around his body, like he was protecting himself from being hurt.

Vlad shook his head. "Needing to lean on someone for support doesn't make you weak. Breaking down to let out some of the stress that's built up because life piles a ton of shit on you that you can't handle all alone doesn't make you weak. You went through everything, you endured so much, and you came through it. You didn't give up. You continued fighting through what seemed like a hopeless task. That makes you strong." He frowned, feeling disgusted at himself. "If we're talking about weakness, that applies to me. I ran away from the truth. I hid from it, using anger and bitterness to mask what I truly wanted. I turned away from my friends."

Danny stepped forward, taking Vlad's face in his hands. "But you stopped running. You turned around and you faced the truth and you've grabbed hold of your friends again. You may have _been_ weak, but that's not who you are _now_."

Vlad reached up, placing his hands upon Danny's wrists. "And I couldn't have done that without you."

Danny smiled, a brief ray of light, before he frowned. "Are you going to keep pushing me away just because I'm eighteen? I'm not saying I want to jump into bed with you right away." He paused with a light flush coloring his cheeks. "I mean in the sex way. I couldn't get to sleep on the couch last night after Sam and Tuck went home. But I managed to fall asleep easily when I climbed into bed with you. But what I'm trying to say is that I'm okay with taking it slow. Like dating. I want to get to know more about you, and I want to tell you about everything important to me." He stared unwaveringly into Vlad's eyes. "I'm not going to regret being in a relationship with you. And I get that the age thing is a major thing, and it will probably weird out a lot of people if they find out about us. But screw them! I want to see where you and I can go. Together."

The only answer Vlad gave Danny was to lean in close and capture the young man's mouth in a second kiss.


	23. Chapter 22

"Vlad."

He tensed, keeping his gaze straight ahead in his refusal to tear his eyes from the street and stare at the woman sitting next to him. Vlad knew that slightly lowered tone with an underlying of anger that made him swallow thickly as he felt a prickle of sweat down the back of his neck. It wasn't the first time he heard Maddie speak in such a way. It expressed her displeasure, and Vlad had a very good idea from where that anger stemmed.

It felt like a lifetime ago that they had left Fenton Works, each of them dressed neatly, to meet with the head of the Amity Park branch of the Guys in White. Maddie abandoned the jumpsuit, deciding on a suit that gave her a more business woman type look, but Vlad found the apparel strange after growing used to her wearing the teal jumpsuit. Up until she uttered that single word, the car ride was filled with a relaxed silence, the relief that followed after the tension that built up before the meeting. Vlad slouched, an unnatural thing for him, as he let his mind fade into the blissfulness of not having to stress out any longer. He assumed that Maddie did the same as she drove their regular car, that they decided to take rather than the Assault Vehicle, but apparently, her mind was on something else. He had a deep suspicion of what might be going on in Maddie's mind.

"Yes, Maddie?" Vlad tried to speak in a calm, pleasant manner, but he could hear the strain in his own voice. He expected rage from her, perhaps shouting and cursing and wishing death upon him. His hands wiped nervously upon his pants.

"Do you honestly," Maddie squeezed her hands around the steering wheel, her voice continuing in that same low, angry tone, "think that it is appropriate to prey upon an eighteen year old boy while you are in your forties?"

Vlad knew the question was coming, but it still left him feeling blindsided that the woman would blurt it out so bluntly. "You knew?"

"Of course I did! Did you think I was oblivious?" Violet eyes snapped toward him as Maddie hit the brake, screeching to a stop at an intersection. "The way Danny always keeps close to you. The little touches. That whole vampire joke thing at the breakfast table. The way he came into the kitchen in only a _towel_ to catch your attention. Or how about the way he pressed up against you this morning when you were making breakfast?" Her mouth pulled thin, and the anger that flashed in her narrowing eyes chilled him.

No, of course she would notice all of that and realize what was happening between the two men. Vlad would have to be an idiot to think she wouldn't take notice of it. "I do understand that our ages call any relationship between us into question. Do you think I haven't considered that?" He frowned at Maddie as the light turned green and she pressed on the gas. "I know Danny is young, and I know it would be a lot easier on him if he chose to look for someone his own age."

Maddie released a sigh, lifting one hand from the steering wheel to rub at her forehead. "Danny hasn't really had interactions with other people beyond Jack and myself in a long time. And those interactions were usually, well, clinical." She cringed when she said it. "Once he became Jack's bodyguard, we weren't cruel to him, but we still looked at him as an enemy and a subject to examine. But what I'm trying to say is that Danny hasn't talked with a lot of people, like _really_ talked to them. And then you turn up and talk with him and treat him like normal. Naturally he's going to grow attached to you."

"I realize that!" Vlad shouted, the anger exploding from him before he could stop it. He paused and took a breath before relaxing back against the seat. "I'm very much aware that he could quickly realize that what he thinks he feels right now isn't real. I'm also aware that anything we do together he might regret when he realizes that his feelings were false. He's young. Once he's gotten his GED, he can get into college then get a great job. He might meet someone along the way that he falls madly in love with, leaving me all alone again. These thoughts have been going through my head ever since I first realized I was thinking about him in that way. Do you realize that I haven't even thought about anyone else since I met you and became obsessed with the idea of being with you? I realize now that those feelings weren't true, but now-" Vlad ran a hand over his face, feeling drained. "These feelings sneaked up on me, and I think Danny has a point. Should we really ignore these feelings just because of an age difference? Or because these feelings developed toward the first person that we really connected with in a long time? A relationship has to start somewhere. We don't plan to rush into this. I'm not looking to steal him away and have my nasty way with him like some pervert. I care about Danny. It could be love, but I can't say that for sure until we've spent more time together and gotten to know each other better."

"Vlad, he is confused. He doesn't know _what_ he wants." Maddie's mouth pursed, and her jaw set tightly. "He's too young-"

"He's not fourteen," Vlad argued, his voice growing louder. "He's eighteen, and while that may be young, he is no longer a child that needs his mother to protect him from everything." He bit down on his tongue before he could blurt out anything else that might hurt Maddie's feelings. That wasn't his intention. "I'm sorry." He bowed his head. "Even if it wasn't me, Danny would still make mistakes in his life. Everyone makes mistakes. I probably more than most. But making mistakes is a part of learning and growing, and you can't keep him from making them. I might be one of those mistakes, but I'm going to make sure I'm not a mistake that he regrets. Kissing may happen. Light touches here and there, sure. But we're not going to secret away into a dark corner and make out like lust filled, horny teenagers who only care about something on a carnal level. This could be the real thing for me, Maddie. This could be the love I've been too scared to find until now. I don't want this just on a physical level. I want this on an emotional and personal level too. You've raised your son into a great young man, and I want to get to know him better."

"I do want you to be happy, Vlad." Maddie sighed, some of the anger flowing out of her in that one breath. "And I want Danny to be happy too. But-"

"Danny's your son, and you worry for him. That's only natural. And I know I'm no saint." Vlad dropped his gaze. "I've done a lot that people should hate me for or look at me with disgust. But Danny looks at me like there's still hope for me to become a good man. That means a lot to me. I probably couldn't have moved on from everything if not for your son." He lifted his head and turned his gaze onto Maddie. "I'm not going to hurt your son. I'm going to do whatever I can to keep from hurting him."

Maddie sighed again, and for a time, they continued down the street in silence. "I never imagined that the two of you would become this close in such a short amount of time."

"I didn't see it coming either."

"Just remember that if you _do_ hurt my son, I will make you regret it." Her voice was deadly, and if he didn't know any better, Vlad might suspect her of being half ghost too with the way the air in the car seemed to drop in temperature. Perhaps that was just his own imaginings.

"I have no doubts about that."

A tension hung over them for the rest of the ride back to Fenton Works, but Maddie wasn't promising to tear him apart molecule by molecule for perverting her son. Vlad took that to mean that while she may not approve of their relationship currently, Maddie would at least stand back and allow Danny to make his own life decisions.

When they arrived at Fenton Works, Maddie parked the car out front. Before they even climbed out of the car, Jack stood in the open doorway with an anxious look on his face, waiting for them to tell him how the meeting went. Vlad couldn't see Danny anywhere, but he knew the young half ghost would be lurking close to his father until they heard news about whether or not the hit still stood. They walked up to the front door, and Jack drew his wife into a tight embrace, burying his face into the crook on her neck. After a few minutes, they pulled apart and entered the house with their hands tightly clasped together. Vlad followed after them and closed the door.

"How did things go?" Danny questioned as Vlad entered the front room. He was perched on the armrest of the couch, looking ready to spring should an attack come. A half eaten sandwich sat on the coffee table, along with a tall glass of milk that was nearly finished. As hungry as he probably remained, Danny was still playing it cautious with how much he ate at one time.

"You should have seen the look on their faces when they saw us," Maddie said, smiling a little smugly as she took a seat on the couch.

"You," Vlad corrected with a small smirk. "When they saw you."

When they walked into the Guys' in White headquarter, every agent in the lobby halted what they were doing and stared at Maddie, gaping like she was some alien creature come to rain destruction upon their corporation. Vlad couldn't help a certain sense of smugness as the woman at the front desk stuttered, struggling to get her words out as Maddie stood in front of her, demanding to see the head of the branch. The brunette woman picked up the phone and made a quick call in a whispered voice, though they could clearly understand her words.

"Uh, Sir," she said, and Vlad wouldn't be surprised if her knees were knocking under the desk. "M-Maddie Fenton is here to see you." She nodded a few times with an occasional murmur of agreement. When she hung up the phone, she lifted her terrified brown eyes to them. "Agent Miller will see you now." She gestured to the elevators with one hand. "His office is on the top level."

"They _should_ be scared of Mom," Danny said with a proud smirk. "The Guys in White agents wouldn't even stand a chance against her in a fight."

"But how did the meeting with their boss go?" Jack frowned with some concern.

"I think they were mostly just shocked to see us coming to them," Maddie said as she removed the heels that she wore to the meeting, "especially after the way we rejected their offer before. Agent Miller tried to look like he wasn't taken by surprise when we entered his office."

Vlad folded his arms as he leaned against the wall by the door to the front room. "I think he greatly underestimated Maddie's intelligence." He shook his head, feeling sorry for the man.

Agent Miller reminded Vlad a great deal of the agent that they encountered when Cujo was running around the high school. He was tall, broad shouldered, and bald. His sunglasses sat upon his wide nose, and Vlad wondered if the corporation believed that the sunglasses somehow gave the impression of being more intimidating. Vlad simply saw it as silly to wear sunglasses indoors.

"What brings you here, Mrs. Fenton?" Agent Miller questioned with his fingers laced as he leaned on his elbows on the desk. The office lacked any other seat besides the one that the man sat in, and Vlad was slightly miffed that they were expected to stand the entire time. "Come to reconsider our offer?" The corners of his mouth twitched, almost allowing a smirk to appear before he schooled his expression, and Vlad restrained the laugh that tried to bubble up inside him. Agent Miller was seriously deluded if he believed for one second that Maddie would give their offer even a second of consideration.

"Hardly," Maddie responded in a crisp, clipped manner. She wasn't here to beat around the bush or play mind games with the enemy. She was here for one single purpose, and she wasn't going to allow anything to distract her from it. Walking up to the desk, she dropped the stack of papers onto it.

"What is this?" Agent Miller lifted an eyebrow, and any amusement he had left quickly faded as it occurred to him that he wouldn't be getting his way.

"This," Maddie said, and Vlad could hear the hint of smugness in her voice as her hand rested on top of the paper, fingers splayed out over the neat, white page, "is evidence of every foul, illegal activity that your precious little corporation has done in the past four years in order to climb to the top as the best known ghost hunters in the world."

Agent Miller snorted. "If you think slandering our name is going to help you, you are sadly mistaken." He stood up, hands pressed on the desktop as he leaned over, trying to use his superior height and build to intimidate the woman. "The Guys in White have nothing to hide from the public. All we are concerned with is protecting the world from the evil ghosts that threaten our livelihood."

"Well, then I'm _sure_ the public would _love_ to testimony from an assassin that you hired to kill my husband." Maddie glared evenly at the man, not about to back down and cower before him. "We have a signed confession that you threatened her life, and the lives of her family, in order to make her accept the job. We also have evidence to show that you've been recapturing the same ghosts in different towns to continue making the public believe that you're providing a service to them so that they will give you donations for your continued protection."

"Those files are private, and there is no way you could ever get your hands on them!" Agent Miller shouted, a vein pulsing on his bald head. Then he realized the admission and stood up straight, smoothing down his white suit. "But of course, there are no such records to be found."

"Well then, if you think you have nothing to hide," Maddie smirked as she picked up the stack of papers, "maybe I should go contact some of the local newspapers and news programs and hand over what we found."

"Wait!" Agent Miller grabbed for the papers, but Maddie refused to let him rip them from her grasp.

"We have more than one copy of those papers," Vlad informed the man, in case Agent Miller thought he could simply destroy them and be done with it.

Agent Miller's lip curled back, showing off pearly white teeth. "What is it you people want?"

"You take the hit off my husband," Maddie said in a no nonsense tone, cold and deadly. "And you promise that his life, and lives of those in my family will never be in harm's way again."

His mouth pursed, and Vlad thought for a moment Agent Miller would reject that term. "Fine. Done."

"And you get the hell out of Amity Park and never return," Maddie added, and Agent Miller's eye gave a twitch that they could see even with the sunglasses that he wore.

"You can't be serious," the man growled, his hand tightening around the papers so that they creased and wrinkled in his hold. "Amity Park has the highest amount of ghostly activity of any other city we've been to. You think we're going to give this place up?"

Maddie shrugged, like he was asking her if she liked how the weather was today. "You can either leave, or I take the information we have on you to the media and the public can decide what to do with you." She smiled a little too sweetly at him.

Agent Miller gritted his teeth, scowling darkly in his frustration over that term. "Fine," he ground out the word like he had to force it out of his mouth or suffer suffocation as it stuck in his throat. They couldn't see his eyes, but Vlad could feel the burn of his glare like the heat of the sun against his skin.

Maddie released her hold on the papers, and Agent Miller took a stumbling step backward. "Good." Her smile was false but polite. "And if we discover that you are continuing with these unorthodox business practices, you can feel secure in the knowledge that we _will_ be providing all evidence against you to the public." The smile fell as she glared seriously at him. "We'll be watching. You can count on that."

"I'm pretty sure he actually flipped his desk when we left," Vlad said after they finished recounting the details of the meeting.

"Hm, that was a pretty loud crash we heard," Maddie agreed with a nod.

Jack sighed, his body deflating somewhat as he leaned back against the couch. Suddenly, the bags under his eyes looked more pronounced, and he seemed like he could use a month of sleeping. Even Danny relaxed his posture after he heard how the meeting went with the head of the Guys in White. Finally, he could stop stressing and worrying about his father's life being danger. Finally, he could return to be an average teenager where his only worries were studying and finding time to hang out with his friends.

"I guess we should tell Pamela the good news," Maddie said as she set her high heels on top of the coffee table. "I'm sure she'll be glad to return to her family."

Vlad nodded. "We can worry about what to do with that other hit man later."

The family of three got up from the couch, and Vlad followed them toward the laboratory to release the woman.


	24. Chapter 23

"And in an unexpected move today, the head of the Amity Park division of the Guys in White, Agent Miller, announced that they will be pulling out and leaving the safety of Amity Park in the very capable hands of-" Tiffany Snow blinked a few times at the teleprompter as behind her, viewers could see men dressed in white suits loading up trucks. "Is that right? That can't be right. Did someone mess with the teleprompter again? Because this isn't funny anymore!" Her face twisted into annoyance and anger as she glared at the camera. Then she frowned as she placed a hand to her ear, nodding as she listened to whomever spoke to her. "Well," she said with her brow creased and an unpleasant look in her eyes, "it seems that my teleprompter isn't being played with. Agent Miller did in fact announce that the Guys in White would be leaving Amity Park's safety in the capable hands of Jack and Maddie Fenton. I can't believe it," she added in a mutter before they could switch away from her. "We're supposed to feel safe with those-"

Danny, thankfully, shut off the television before he joined them at the kitchen table, carrying a glass of milk with him. "I'm glad they're leaving town," he said as he sat down, a frown crossing his face, "but I wish the new reporters wouldn't be such jerks. They act like Mom and Dad are completely incompetent as ghost hunters." His eyes shifted to bright green in his flash of anger.

"Getting angry won't do any good," Maddie said, slicing a sliver from her steak. "They can make whatever comments they like, but their opinions have no bearing on how competent we really are."

"And anyway, if we work on having better ghost relations, we'll show that we're way more suited than those stupid Guys in White," Jack added with a wide grin. Excitement danced in his blue eyes as the prospect of conversing with ghosts.

"We shouldn't let our guard down though simply because they've agreed to leave town," Vlad said as he carefully cut up his steak into manageable bite sized slivers. "The Guys in White are a sneaky and greedy corporation. They're aware that there's an unusually high number of ghosts in Amity Park, and they view that as a gold mine for them. They're retreating for now, but I wouldn't be surprised if they wished to find some other way to sink their teeth back into this town." Vlad stabbed his fork into one sliver of steak, already trying to think ten moves ahead of the Guys in White so that they would be prepared if the corporation showed up again.

"Can we not talk about it?" Danny asked, groaning as his shoulders sagged. "I know we can't let our guard down just because they've agreed to our terms for now, but I'd like one night where it's not the topic of discussion at dinner." The three adults exchanged glances and came to the silent consensus to drop all talk about the Guys in White for the time being. Danny's gaze swept around the table, and he frowned. "Is it really necessary to keep us from sitting next to each other?" His eyes slipped half shut in a dull glare at his parents.

"We just feel that it's best if you have some space between you," Jack said with an awkward shift as he sat next to his son at the table. He was no happier to learn about the relationship between his son and his best friend, but he, like Maddie, realized that standing between them wasn't the best way to go about it. There were some battles to fight with a teenager, and others that were better left to compromise. This wouldn't be the first time parents rejected the relationship of one of their children, and trying to stand in the way might result in Danny acting out by rebelling against any rules they tried to lay down for him. In this instant, they were better off tolerating the relationship. At least Danny wasn't trying to keep it secret from them.

Danny sighed dramatically as he rolled his eyes. "It's not like we're about to make out on the table." At that comment, Jack nearly choked on his mashed potatoes.

"Daniel!" Maddie chided as she narrowed her violet eyes across the table at him.

As Danny apologized to his mother in a mumble, Vlad said calmly, "I do think your parents have a point though."

"What?" Danny shouted, his eyes growing wide as he gaped at the older half ghost.

Vlad lifted his eyebrows in return at the young man's shock. "As much as we like each other and wish to know more about each other, it's only natural that we'd also have to spend time apart from each other. We said we would take things slowly, after all."

Danny frowned as he lowered his gaze, sadly pushing at the potatoes with his fork like he was trying to mold it into some sort of shape. "Does that mean you'll be leaving soon? Going back to wherever you lived before?" He wouldn't lift his gaze from his plate, perhaps afraid of the older half ghost's answer.

"There isn't all that much for me in Wisconsin." Vlad shrugged then brought his glass up for a sip of water.

"Except the Packers," Jack put in with a wide grin.

Vlad slid his gaze across the table at the man, and a smile tugged at his mouth. "Yes, except for that." He rested the glass back on the table. "I've been thinking that, perhaps, it's time for a change of scenery." He waited until Danny lifted his gaze enough for their eyes to meet. "Amity Park seems quite nice."

Danny's head lifted fully, his eyes growing wide as his lips parted, mouth stretching wide in a smile. "Really?"

"Well, it does seem like the most logical choice," Maddie said with a small smirk. "It would be very inconvenient if he's going to help us develop better relations with ghosts if he's all the way in Wisconsin."

"And I can continue to help you with learning to use your powers," Vlad added, though it seemed that Danny was quickly mastering what Vlad had to teach him. They sparred earlier using energy manipulation, and the young half ghost fared quite nicely. Moving to Amity Park would also allow him and Danny to continue their relationship in a more natural manner. They could go on dates like normal couples and not have a long distance in their way. There was the disadvantage, though, of their age gap that would have people turning to look at them with disgust. Their dates would have to be somewhere out of the public eye. But that was just another matter that they would find a way to get around if they chose to stay together.

Danny smiled with immense happiness at the news that Vlad would be staying in Amity Park. Vlad could imagine that expression playing across the young man's face if it were announced that he would get to be an astronaut on the next mission into space. The thought brought a small smile to Vlad's face. The rest of their dinner conversation revolved around local real estate as Jack and Maddie mentioned what houses they knew were up for sale.

 

Vlad walked slowly about the hall, glancing at the various posters decorating the walls and the glass display case that showed off trophies and awards with team photos. His move to Amity Park was coming along nicely. He found a small but reasonably home, deciding that he had no need to live in a large, luxurious mansion. He was well off with his savings from all the jobs he took as a hit man, but he saw no reason to waste it all on a home too large for him. His castle in Wisconsin went up on the market to be sold, but not before he took down the Portal and destroyed all evidence of its existence. He dreaded the thought that the Guys in White would somehow discover the castle and uncover the plans on how to build the Portal, so Vlad made certain there was nothing left for them to find.

When the office door opened, Vlad turned back around to face it. Hours felt like they passed since they first arrived and he was left to wander the hall alone.

"Thanks a lot, Mr. Lancer," Danny said, smiling as he stepped out of the office with the overweight, balding vice principal with him. He held a thick packet in his hands, the information that he would need for getting his GED. His body looked more filled in now, after plenty of good meals and exercising. They decided that it was probably safe to allow him to eat however much he liked without fear of any severe internal damage.

"You are quite welcome," Lancer said with a pleasant smile in return. "I'm very proud of you." He placed a hand on the young man's shoulder. "It couldn't have been easy for you to go through all of that, yet you're taking the steps to continue forward and not allow it to hold you back from getting an education and having a successful life. Should you need anything else, my door will always be open."

"Of course, Sir!" Danny glanced nervously at the packet in his hands. "Something tells me I'm definitely going to be coming back a few more times." Dread filled his eyes as he chewed on his lower lip. "Four years is a lot of school work to catch up on. Even with my parents," he threw a glance toward Vlad, "and friends to help, there's probably a lot that I'll need to ask about the stuff I need to learn before I take the GED."

"Stop by any time." Lancer paused and reconsidered his statement. "Well, preferably when school isn't in session. I do have classes to teach after all. Though I'm sure some of my students pay no attention." His mouth pressed into a thin line as displeasure showed in his green eyes. It probably filled him with great happiness to see Danny coming to him for help with his education. Then Lancer's gaze drifted toward Vlad. "You must be Mr. Masters." He held out a hand toward him.

"Yes," Vlad responded as he shook the vice principal's hand. "Danny's parents were busy holding a meeting with the mayor about measures to secure the safety of Amity Park from ghosts, so I drove Danny here today." That brought another thought to his mind as he turned his gaze on the young half ghost. "We'll have to work in some time to teach you to drive."

Danny sighed, being perhaps a touch over dramatic. "Just another thing to add to the list." He was eager to learn all the things he missed in the past four years, though Vlad suspected some of that eagerness would disappear when he really delved into studying everything for the GED. But the suffering he went through now would pay off in the end when he got into college and could continue with his life like anyone else. Of course, he wasn't like everyone else, but being half ghost didn't have to stop him from having a mostly normal life.

Lancer nodded. "It's good that he has a lot of people around to support and help him." He stared at Danny, and sadness entered his eyes. "I'm sorry I never got the chance to teach you more. You showed a lot of potential before, well, that happened."

"I'm sorry I didn't get to learn more from you." Danny frowned , and Vlad could see it in his expression how much it hurt the young half ghost to have missed the last four years of his life.

Lancer sighed as he checked his watch. "Unfortunately, I have to go prepare for a class." He patted Danny on the shoulder. "I hope you do well in everything."

"Thanks." Danny smiled then watched as the man headed down the hall to his classroom. "Well, the first step on the long road is done." He sighed with relief, but he knew there was still a lot of work left ahead of him.

"You're not alone in this though," Vlad reminded as they started down the hall back toward the entrance of the school. "I'm here to help you. Your parents will help you. Your friends will help you. That vice principal will help you." He placed a hand on Danny's shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "You can do this." He firmly believed that Danny could accomplish anything so long as he put his mind to it and stuck with it until the end.

"Fenton?"

At the man's voice, they both stopped and turned around to the speaker. Danny blinked, stunned by the blond man that stood before them. Vlad recognized him from the night they visited the school when Cujo popped up there. At that time, the man was wearing a football uniform. Now, he dressed in plain jeans and a black shirt with a letterman jacket.

"Dash?" Danny's voice was barely above a whisper, uncertainty not only his tone but his tense body language.

Suddenly, the jock closed the distance and drew Danny into a tight embrace that left the young half ghost speechless. Vlad raised his brows, not knowing what to say in this situation.

"How the hell are you even here?" Dash questioned, pulling back with his hands still on Danny's shoulders. "They - Your parents said you were dead."

"Um," Danny rubbed the back of his neck as he looked away, his gaze finding Vlad. "It was a kidnapping," he said, reciting the story they decided to use. "I was stupid and was walking alone, and the guy grabbed me by surprise. He kept me locked up and didn't ask for a ransom, so my parents didn't have any idea about what happened to me." He shrugged awkwardly. "I managed to get away and make my way back home."

Dash's mouth hung open, gaping in shock. "Shit, Fenton!" He pulled a hand away from Danny to rake it through his blond locks. "You hear about kidnappings sometimes, but you never expect it to be someone you know." He frowned, brow creasing as he stared at Danny. "I just - After it was announced that you were dead, I always wished I had to opportunity to apologize for being such a dick to you. I had a lot of issues going on in my life, but I shouldn't have taken them out on you like that. It was like a real kick to the head when I heard you were dead, and I felt like such a dick. Shit! I probably sound like a selfish jerk. I wanted to apologize just to make myself feel better about the crap I did."

"Hey, it's okay." Danny reached out to pat Dash on the shoulder. "I don't hate you for anything. I mean, I hate the things you did, but I'm over it. So, uh, I guess I forgive you."

It was like a weight lifted off the jock in that moment. A hint of a smile ghosted upon Dash's face as the forgiveness erased the guilt that otherwise would have stayed with him for the rest of his life. "Thanks, man." He bumped a fist lightly against Danny's shoulder. "Are you coming back to school?"

Danny shook his head. "I'll be studying to get my GED." He waved the packet in his hand then groaned. "Four years of studying to cram into a short amount of time. This is sure to be fun."

"Well, hey, if you need help, Kwan's a whiz with math and stuff, and I'm not that bad when it comes to history."

Danny blinked a few times. "You... want to help me?"

"Yeah, man!" Dash smiled broadly, showing off straight white teeth. "Consider it atoning for past wrongs."

Danny nodded jerkily. "I'll keep that in mind." But his expression said he could hardly believe Dash was offering to help him. "Uh, shouldn't you be getting to class?"

"Oh, shit! Thanks, man!" Dash gave a wave before he jogged down the hall away from them.

Danny lifted a hand and waved with slow, mechanical movements until Dash disappeared from sight. "That was weird," he murmured, seeming to still be in shock over the meeting. "Dash being nice?" His head swiveled about as he gaped at Vlad. "I never would have imagined that!"

"I guess that's why your friend said you should meet with him," Vlad said, recalling when Tucker brought Danny the burger that first day they found out about Danny. He reached out and took hold of Danny's hand, tugging him along toward the entrance. "How about we go get some food? Then we can take a look at that information and decide a plan for diving into all the studying you'll need to do."

"The food sounds good." Danny grinned at that suggestion. "The studying, not so much. But," he sighed, "I know I'm just going to have set my mind to getting it done and stick with it. Even if I get really frustrated with it."

"And that's where sparring will come in handy." Vlad smirked. "You can take out your frustrations that way."

"I can think of another way." The smirk Danny wore was suggestive, as was the glow in his eyes. His thumb brushed over the back of Vlad's hand, sending little tingles of heat through him that spread out from that single point of contact. "But, I know it's much too soon for that. Though tempting."

Very tempting indeed, Vlad agreed, and he wondered if Danny had any idea of the effect he had on the older half ghost sometimes. Vlad suspected Danny did and acted that way on purpose to get a reaction from him. They flirted and touched and kissed, but they kept things light, stopping themselves before their actions could lead to something too serious too fast. Vlad was enjoying their slow progress and hoped that they would continue growing closer together, because he was falling in love with everything he learned about the young man. At first, he thought that accepting the hit on Jack would only lead him to trouble. Now he was glad he came to Amity Park and met Danny, who changed his life for the better.


	25. Chapter 24

"I don't have to wear one of those, do I?" Pamela questioned, frowning severely as she looked over the woman standing beside her at the table where the snacks were laid out for everyone to grab whatever they wanted. As strange as it might have seemed prior to everything that happened, Pamela and Maddie became something close to friends. Maddie seemed happy to have another sparring partner, and occasionally Vlad and Danny would also volunteer to practice fighting against her.

As talks with the mayor continued, Maddie suggested that Pamela assist them, even part time, to fight against the more violent ghosts that came into the real world. Being an assassin, Pamela was adept with quite a few different types of weapons. Training her to use ecto based weaponry wouldn't be too difficult. With her good standing in the community, Pamela joining with Maddie and Jack also gave them more credibility to the public that was in doubt of their skills as ghost hunters. If _Pamela Manson_ , of all people, was supporting the Fentons, then they couldn't be as bad as what public opinion said of them.

There was, of course, the looming threat that the Guys in White might try to use her past against her. If they said anything about her past, however, the Guys in White would have questions to answer. How did they uncover Pamela's history as an assassin? Why were they looking for that information in the first place? If they even hinted at what they learned about her, Pamela could easily turn around and expose the truth about their corporation, testifying to the public that the Guys in White threatened her and her family to coerce her into following their orders. It wouldn't be a wise move of the Guys' in White part if they tried to expose Pamela's past to the public.

After they released her from the ghost containment unit, Pamela returned to her family and explained everything to her husband. From what Vlad overheard Sam telling Danny once, her husband Jeremy didn't take it well at first, but after several long talks, Sam somehow managed to convince her father to forgive Pamela for the lies and deception. It was, after all, the only thing that Pamela had lied about to him.

The other assassin was another matter. They showed the man written proof that the Guys in White called off the hit on Jack. The man was furious when he saw it, and Vlad actually worried that the assassin would still try to kill Jack after they released him from the ghost containment unit. Other than a few angry grumbles, the man left with no trouble, though they all remained on guard and tense until he disappeared. They didn't hear anything further from the assassin. Vlad worried about the hit man passing on information about the Portal in the Fentons' laboratory or about their conversation with Technus, though the assassin couldn't overhear the details of that, to the Guys in White. He had Technus keep watch over the information passed through the Guys' in White network in case anything popped up about plans to build their own Portal, but so far, there was no news on that front.

"It isn't a requirement," Maddie answered with only a hint that the questioned upset her. "Though if it would make you feel better, I'm sure we can find a jumpsuit in pink."

Pamela pursed her lips in consideration. "I _might_ wear it then."

"Sounds like our wives are talking shop again," Jeremy commented before biting off one end of a carrot stick. Looking at him now, Vlad never would have guessed that the man had any trouble accepting that his wife used to be an assassin.

"There's nothing hotter than a woman that knows how to wield ecto based weapons," Jack said, hugging his arms around his wife, "and bakes a mean cookie."

"I'm guessing that new recipe was a keeper then?" Maddie questioned, smiling as Jack nodded enthusiastically.

"I must thank you for the contribution to this year's bake sale," Pamela said. "I think you helped push us over last year's total by a landslide."

"I was happy to help." Maddie tapped her glass against the one that Pamela held, the two women toasting to their success at the bake sale.

Vlad smiled at the interaction, happy to see the two sets of parents getting along. He was certain that Danny and Sam were glad their parents weren't at each other throats anymore too. At the thought of the teenagers, Vlad left the kitchen and stepped into the front room where the three friends were sitting on the couch, sharing sweets and drinks. They were laughing about something, and though a thread of jealous crept up in him, Vlad was happy to see Danny relaxing after many stressful days of studying for the GED. They had only scratched the surface of everything he needed to learn, but it was good for him to have a night off to relax his brain and enjoy himself.

"Man! I can't believe you two didn't say anything about it before." Danny shook his head as he twisted his cup around in his hands.

"You had pretty much _just_ come back from the dead," Tucker said as he scratched at a flushed cheek. "It didn't feel like the right time to announce that Sam and I were a couple."

"That and, well, you know." Sam shrugged as she stared down at her feet. "I always thought you liked me, and I did like you, but then-" She frowned, unable to continue with her comment.

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't like you back then." Danny flushed lightly as he ran his hand through his raven locks. "But hey," he dropped his hand and spread his arms out before him, "I'm not going to get angry. I'm really happy for you guys!" He wrapped his arms around his friends' shoulders and hugged them. "And anyway, I kind of, um," he glanced away from his friends, his gaze somehow finding Vlad standing in the doorway, and his cheeks darkened several more shades, "have a boyfriend."

Vlad couldn't stop the smile that spread across his face, almost mirroring the one that Danny wore after he mentioned the word boyfriend. Their glances at each other seemed to go unnoticed by Danny's friends.

"What?" the other two teenagers shouted together, shock making their mouths drop open and their eyes grow wide.

"How come you didn't say anything?" Tucker asked, sounding a bit hurt that Danny didn't tell him anything.

"Who is it? When did it happen?" Sam questioned, wanting details about everything.

"Wait. Wait. Wait!" Tucker threw out an arm before Danny. "When did you decide you were gay?"

"Well," Danny's cheeks remained dark red as he shifted uncomfortably between his friends, "it kind of happened unexpectedly. I mean, it's not like I planned for it to happen or even gave any real conscious thought to, you know, 'oh my god, I'm gay!' or anything like that. It was just something that sort of hit me suddenly, that I really liked this guy." His eyes darted toward Vlad again, holding the older half ghost's gaze. "A lot."

"I'm happy for you." Sam hugged an arm around his friend as Tucker patted Danny on the shoulder. Vlad was happy to see that the other teenagers weren't going to reject Danny based on his sexuality, and Danny looked rather relieved by that fact too. His shoulders sagged somewhat, and a slight sigh slipped past his parted lips.

When the doorbell rang, Jack was down the hall before Vlad could even turn away from the front room. How a man that big could move that fast and that silently, Vlad couldn't fathom the answer. He stood back, leaning against the doorframe as he sipped from his glass of wine and waited for the announcement of whom was at the door.

"Jazzy pants!" Jack exclaimed once the door was opened. He drew the woman standing on the doorstep into a big hug.

"It's nice to see you too, Dad," Jazz said, patting the underside of one arm until her father released her. When Jack stepped aside, Vlad got a better look at her. She shared a lot of physical traits with her mother, almost reaching the same height as Maddie already. She wore a teal head scarf in her short auburn hair, reaching to her shoulders with her bangs swept to one side. She set her bags down, and her aqua colored eyes looked bright and eager to learn as they glanced about the front hall. "The Mansons came over?" she questioned in confusion, catching sight of Pamela through the kitchen doorway.

"A lot has happened recently," Jack said awkwardly, and Vlad wondered how much Jazz knew about the hit on her father's life. Jack and Maddie might have felt it best to keep her in the dark so that she wouldn't worry and could stay focus on her studying at college. "Oh! And this is Vlad Masters. He was my roommate back in college. My best friend." He grinned proudly.

"A pleasure to meet you," Vlad said as he stretched out a hand toward her.

"Nice to meet you too," Jazz said numbly as she shook his hand.

Out of the corner of his eye, Vlad could see Danny hesitantly getting to his feet. They hadn't told Jazz anything about him yet, and now was the moment that Danny had anxiously awaited since his mother announced that Jazz would be coming home for Christmas. For days, Danny was a nervous ball of energy that could hardly sit still long enough to focus on his studying. Now Jazz was finally here. He would get to see his sister again, and she would know it was him. Vlad could almost hear the quickening of Danny's heart as he worried about his sister's reaction. Tucker and Sam remained sitting on the couch, leaving Danny to face his sister alone.

"Jazz," Danny said with a slight waver in his voice as he stepped into the hall, appearing before his sister for the first time in four years. His hands wiped nervously at his jeans as he waited for her reaction.

Jazz gasped, hands flying to her mouth. Her head snapped around toward her father, disbelief shining in her eyes. A hint of a smile grew upon Jack's face as he nodded to her. When she turned back, tears were gathered in her eyes. "Danny?" She stepped over to him, hand shaking as she reached out to touch his face. The tears fell the second after his fingers brushed his skin, felt warm soft flesh beneath them. "Danny!" She pulled him into a tight embrace, eyes clamped shut as the tears fell. "How is this eve possible?" She didn't release him, burying her face against the crook of his neck.

Danny wrapped one arm around his sister's body. The other hand reached up, and his fingers threaded through her auburn hair. "What happened four years ago," he said, keeping his voice quiet, "the accident with the Portal, it didn't kill me. I guess you could say it only halfway got the job done." His mouth twitched, almost trying to smile, but the seriousness of what happened was no laughing matter. "I really did think I was dead. I woke up in the Ghost Zone, and I had the appearance of the ghost. It wasn't until recently that I discovered I was still alive."

Jazz's arms tightened around him, her fingers curling and grabbing hold of his sweater. "Do you have any idea how much it hurt all of us to think you were dead?" She sobbed against his neck.

"I'm sorry," Danny said sadly, rubbing his hand over her back in a soothing motion. "I wish I had known the truth sooner so that I could have saved you all from suffering like that."

Jazz shook her head, clinging to Danny like she feared he would disappear from her if she released him. "Please tell me this isn't a dream. Please tell me I haven't cracked and I'm suffering hallucinations because I so desperately want to believe you're still alive."

Pain filled Danny's blue eyes, knowing his family had suffered a great deal when they were forced to announce his death and bury an empty coffin. "I'm here. I'm real. I'm not going to leave again."

Vlad and Jack stood back, allowing the siblings to stand there holding each other while Jazz cried against her brother. No one interrupted them. No one complained that they were being overly dramatic about their reunion. Most of those gathered that night at Fenton Works had gone through the same emotional reunion after discovering that Danny wasn't dead, wasn't just another ghost. They waited patiently until Jazz cried out the four years of sorrow over the loss of her younger brother. When she was done, Jazz pulled back, wiping her eyes dry.

"You better not give us a scare like that again for a long, _long_ time." Jazz gave her brother a stern glare, but the smile that kept trying to break across her face ruined the look. "So," she smirked a little, "I never would have thought my little brother would have a thing for older guys."

Vlad nearly choked on his drink, coughing a few times before his airway cleared again. Danny, meanwhile, glanced away with darkening cheeks.

"It was obvious by the way you couldn't stop staring at him," Jazz said, glancing Vlad's way, and he remembered that she was studying psychology. Naturally, she would be observant and pick up on things, body language and such, that other people wouldn't even think about noticing.

"It's not like I go around checking out every guy in his forties," Danny argued, folding his arms. "It's only Vlad."

"Well, so long as he treats you right," Jazz smiled at her brother before turning back to Vlad as her aqua colored eyes narrowed and her mouth pursed into a thin line, "then he won't have to fear for his life."

"Duly noted." Vlad bowed his head to her. The Fenton family certainly wouldn't sit back if anyone threatened harm, in any manner, upon another member of their family. "I do care for your brother very much."

"Jazz!" Maddie came down the hall and drew her daughter into a hug. "Now that everyone's here, we can start dinner."

They had snacked on vegetables and sweets for the past hour while waiting for the final guest of the night to show up, but they were all hungry and ready to get to the main star of the night: the turkey, and though Christmas wasn't for another two days, they decided to have a big festive dinner the night Jazz returned home from college. They headed into the kitchen to move aside the snacks and prepare the table for the large gathering to sit and enjoy their dinner. For the Fenton family, this would be perhaps the best Christmas they had had in quite some time as their family was finally reunited. For Vlad, it would be the happiest Christmas he could recall in over two decades as he finally had a family with which to celebrate.


End file.
